


The Hydra Games

by PenPatronusAooO



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Avengers Family, Avengers Feels, BAMF Natasha Romanov, Gen, Hurt Bruce, Hurt Bruce Banner, Hurt Clint, Hurt Clint Barton, Hurt Steve, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt Thor, Hurt Tony, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Not Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Not Iron Man 3 Compliant, Post-Avengers (2012), Pre-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Protective Nick Fury, Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-11
Updated: 2016-03-11
Packaged: 2018-05-26 03:38:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6222139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PenPatronusAooO/pseuds/PenPatronusAooO
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was just a game. Nobody was supposed to get hurt - nobody was supposed to die! Howard Stark and the founders of S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy created the Hydra Games to train their field agents, but it's a deadly different challenge when the REAL Hydra infiltrates them. Tony gets shot. Clint gets blown up. Steve gets drugged. Bruce gets shish kebab-ed. Thor gets sassy.</p><p>STORY COMPLETE!</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hydra Games

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on FanFiction.net.

Steve Rogers tasted blood on his teeth. He coughed, and one of his ribs went from cracked to broken. Swallowing a scream made his eyes water, so the image of Bruce Banner crawling past him rippled like a mirage. "Tony!" Bruce shouted. "Tony!" Steve rolled onto his stomach and waited for the world to stop swaying. Gradually the scene came into focus.

Five feet away, a red-faced Stark was writhing on the ground with one hand plastered to his black t-shirt and the other gripping Bruce's arm. "What's wrong with him?" Steve asked with a slur in his words. He crawled over and knelt beside Stark. "Doc?"

"Must be a localized EMP," Banner reported. "An electromagnetic pulse. It disables any technology in the blast radius." Steve couldn't understand the scientist's technobabble even when he DIDN’T have a headache, but he knew one thing for sure: Tony's chest was supposed to be glowing, and it was dark. "It deactivated the arc reactor." Bruce's face turned red as Tony's started to go white. "The m-magnet isn't holding back the shrapnel in his chest anymore."

"What do we do?" Steve grasped Tony's trembling hand.

"I don't – we can't – there's n-nothing we can do! It'll take five minutes, minimum, for the reactor to automatically reboot."

"S-six and a half," Tony stuttered.

Bruce combed his fingers through his hair and gripped the ends. "Oh my god…"

"Is that enough time?" Steve demanded. Banner didn't answer. He didn't have to.

Tony shuddered. His eyes bulged. Sweat soaked his hairline. "H-hammer," he whispered.

Bruce and Steve put their ears to Tony's lips so quickly that their heads bumped. "Stark, we can't hear you."

Tony's body bucked and he almost broke their noses with his forehead. "Hammer."

"What?"

Stark opened his mouth to elaborate, but suddenly went limp. Butterfly eyelashes fluttered. Steve squeezed his cold fingers. "Tony? TONY!"

"Too late…" Tony wheezed. "Bruce… Steve… God, just hold me, p-please."

\---------

5 HOURS EARLIER

Clint Barton raised his hand but didn't wait for permission to speak. "The last time I played the Hydra Games I broke my arm."

On the other side of the Helicarrier's conference table, Nick Fury leaned back in his seat and propped his fingers into a steeple under his chin. "You also broke the Academy record by 2 hours. I lost a bet to Coulson."

"You bet against me—? Not the point." Clint kept his arm in the air and indicated his head. "This is the point: I already took this test."

"Not with them." Fury gestured at the table of Avengers.

On Fury's left, Natasha leaned towards Bruce and whispered, "I heard that's the only reason why he graduated from the Academy."

Bruce gave Barton a kind smile, then whispered, "His grades were that bad?"

"Agent Hill had S.H.I.E.L.D. History with him. After two years he still didn't know the difference between Howard Stark and Steve Rogers."

"As I was saying." Fury sat up straight and cleared his throat. "As I was saying, every S.H.I.E.L.D. academy field agent had to beat the Hydra Games to graduate. For a new team you performed satisfactorily in New York—"

"Satisfactorily?" On Fury's right, past a pensive Captain America, on the left of a bored Thor, Tony Stark looked flabbergasted. "Saving the world from an alien invasion is only satisfactory?"

"What I'm saying," Fury growled through clenched teeth, "is that you can do better. The Hydra Games have been training teams for decades and I want you to take the tests, too."

"I'm almost afraid to ask," said Steve, "but why are they called the Hydra games?"

"It's a series of tests, the ultimate obstacle course. Howard Stark created it. He was Tony's father," Fury explained for Thor's benefit. "And if you know Red Skull you know the Greek myth of the hydra."

"If you cut off one head of the snake, two more will grow in its place," Clint recited.

"Hercules defeated it by burning the necks so that the heads couldn't regrow," said Bruce.

"Ah. Clever," said Thor.

"It's just a myth."

"So was he." Romanoff pointed her thumb at Thor.

"Howard called these trials the Hydra Games," Fury continued, "because if you fail one test you have to do two more."

"Two harder tests," said Clint.

"Please, our team has a Hulk and a demi-god and, well, me," Tony said with faux modesty. "We'll pass the first test in two minutes and be done."

Steve shook his head. "Nobody passes the first test."

"How do you know?"

"A guess. Am I right?" Steve cocked an eyebrow at Fury, who nodded.

Stark swiveled in his chair to face Barton. "What's the first test?"

Fury interrupted before Clint could answer. "I'm not making this easy for you. This will be a different game than Barton played. It's been… upgraded. And, you're going in with nothing but your boots. No supplies, no communications, no shield, no Iron Man suit, no magic hammer, no guns, no arrows."

"No Iron Man. No Iron Man?" Tony demanded. "I thought this was supposed to train Avengers."

Fury fixed his eye on Tony. "That's half the point, Stark. You need to learn how to be the Avengers with or without your weapons."

Steve nodded his approval. "Because there's no guarantee we'll have them in hand the next time we're attacked."

Romanoff snorted. "I can't sleep without a knife – preferably one in my hand."

"No weapons," Fury repeated. "And you won't be able to contact us or the S.H.I.E.L.D. staff running the simulations."

"Fine." Tony looked at his watch on his left wrist. "When do we start?"

"Right now." Fury swiveled his chair, raised a remote and summoned a map onto a flat screen. With two clicks he highlighted a small island on the screen. "Right there."

\---------

A lemon sun in a white sky burned down on the figures standing on an island of white sand. "Your 24 hours start in 3, 2, 1, mark." Fury hit a button on his watch and then turned to Coulson. "Breakfast?"

Phil nodded. "That corner café on Palm Beach? That burrito you got last time was thicker than my arm."

"What about that restaurant off the pier – the one with orange vodka cranberry drink – what was it called?

"Sunrise Spit. We could go there for lunch."

"Or dinner."

"As long as I get my Hydra Games day nap."

"Excuse me!" Tony Stark bellowed. He held his arms open, flabbergasted. "You guys are leaving. Really? You think it will take 24 hours for us to finish this." Stark jabbed his thumb at a gray cement building in the sand behind them. It was four stories high, windowless, and the size of a football stadium.

"That's how this works." Coulson's steady smile betrayed how much he enjoyed seeing Tony so anxious.

Fury glanced at his watch. "You're wasting time, Stark."

"Oh, please." Tony tugged on the collar of his standard issue black S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform. "I bet you one of my Camaros that we beat the record by eight hours, minimum."

Fury straightened and called, "Barton, how long did this take you last time?"

Clint had his back turned. He and Natasha were furiously solving math cyphers and typing codes into a keypad on the fortress wall, trying to get inside. "39, Sir."

Tony's jaw dropped. "39 minutes? This will take us less than 39 minutes and you're just going to abandon us here for a whole day?"

"I think he means hours, Stark," Steve said. Cap stood straight in the sand with his arms folded. "39 hours."

Coulson turned back to Fury. "We could head back to New York. Catch a basketball game."

"Why not? We have plenty of time."

Stark watched the two men stroll back to the motorboat that delivered them all from the floating Helicarrier. His face twitched. "Two Camaros!" he called. "Two Camaros says we're tanning in homemade hammocks by the time you get back!"

Bruce clapped his teammate on the shoulder. "Come on, Tony," he said, having no more success than Coulson at hiding his amusement.

"This is ridiculous," Stark said as he fell into step beside Cap and Banner. "What are we going to do in here that we didn't in New York, huh? What?"

"Perhaps the lesson you're meant to learn is patience," said Thor.

Bruce and Steve exchanged wide-eyed, twinkle-eyed looks. "Is he – was that sass?" Tony asked them. "Is the demigod getting sassy on me?"

"We're in," Romanoff called. Clint shouldered open an iron door and revealed a dark, narrow corridor inside. "We better get a move on!"

"And you are enjoying this…why?" Tony asked Natasha.

The Black Widow shrugged. "I never attended the academy. This always sounded like fun." She gestured for Tony to walk inside.

"I'll tell you what's fun—"

"Stark, would you shut up?" Steve was no longer entertained by his friend's mood. He led the way in. "Come on, team, let's—"

"Cap!"

Suit or no suit, Tony Stark was exceptionally athletic. He leapt forward and shoved Steve against the wall. Everyone heard a popping sound and Stark landed on his back with the wind knocked out of him and a red splat on his chest. "It's just paint," Barton said when Bruce gasped. The archer sounded bored, and he stepped over Tony without a glance down at him. "We just failed trial number one: first guy through the door gets shot by a paintball gun and metaphorically killed."

"That was the first test?" Thor asked.

"You knew this would happen?" Tony gasped, wheezing and patting his chest.

"Barton," Cap barked, "why didn't you warn us?" He and Bruce helped Tony back up onto his boots.

"Fury made him promise not to," Natasha said.

"It's rude to spy, Agent Romanoff," Barton said as he sauntered down the hall.

"Spying is my job, Barton."

"So this is going well," Bruce murmured as the rest of the group walked down the corridor after Clint. "Five minutes into this little mission and we're already a man down."

"Come to think of it," Stark said, "shouldn't I just take the rest of the day off since I'm supposedly lying dead in a pool of my own blood?"

Steve winced. He tugged on the extra-tight collar of his own S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform and stared down at his feet as he walked behind Barton. "You don't have to be such a drama queen, Stark. There's no need to take a bullet for me in a simulation."

"Uh, I recall Fury saying that we should approach this like it's 100% real," Tony said. He wiped a stray speck of red paint off of his neck as they walked.

"Oh, don't pretend that's the reason you did that. You were just showing off," Steve snapped.

A genuine look of hurt passed briefly through Tony's facial expressions before he camouflaged it. "Fine. Whatever." Tony pushed away from Bruce and shoved Steve's shoulder as he hurried past him. "Think whatever you want, Cap."

\---------

The Avengers went through a red door and into a chamber lit by a single white candle glued to the stone floor by its own wax. Bruce leaned over to pick it up but Natasha grabbed his hand. "Wait," she hissed, "it could be booby-trapped."

Clint Barton tiptoed over to the candle. He got down on all fours and lowered his face until his nose was inches from the flame. Tony started tapping his foot impatiently while Thor watched, intrigued, as Clint used all five of his senses to investigate the candle. Finally, he jumped back up onto his feet and shrugged. "It's fine." He reached down, grasped the candle like he would a joystick, and lifted it up. The moment the wax untangled from the floor, Clint let out a shriek of agony.

Steve, Thor, Tony and Bruce all echoed his cry and stepped back. "What – what – what the hell?" Stark yelled.

"Barton!" Rogers snapped. "What's wrong?"

Clint cocked his head at a very nonchalant Black Widow. "Come on, Nat, I totally got you."

She rolled her eyes. "You did not get me."

"Did too. I saw panic in your eyes – admit it!"

"Oh, just give me that." Romanoff snatched the candle away and led the way into the chamber. The light only illuminated a few feet ahead so the Avengers moved slowly.

"Hawkeye, do you recall this chamber?" Thor asked.

Clint shook his head. "No, but with the holograms they could make us see anything."

"I see… a gong?" Bruce squinted and pointed to their left. Natasha lifted the candle higher. A bronze circle came into view. It hung from a wooden rung above a ceramic bowl of soot-stained sticks. Natasha tossed the candle into the bowl and the wood ignited.

"Now what?" Tony wondered.

"We have similar contraptions in the underground chambers on Asgard," said Thor. "Observe." Thor adjusted the bronze circle until it faced the fire. Instantly the light reflected off of it, bounced off of a second plate fifteen yards away, and a third past that, and so on until all four walls of the room were visible – including a door. "What is that human phrase? Ta da?" Thor asked.

"Good job." Steve led the way towards the door. "Looks like we passed this one."

A clanging sound behind them. The six superheroes turned to see a column of iron drop from the shadowy ceiling. It was only as thick as Natasha's fist, but two more quickly joined. When one landed in the middle of the group, barely missing Bruce's toes, Steve shouted "Run!" and sprinted towards the door. They were halfway there, dodging spears as they went, when a lid encircled the fire pan and the entire room was plunged back into darkness.

An iron bar landed so close to Natasha that she felt a breeze. She gasped, and leaned back against it, trying to recover her bearings. "This way!" Steve called from the darkness. "Guys, follow my voice!"

"Nat!" Groping hands found her elbow. "You ok?" Barton asked. His breath against her cheek, his arm around her waist, comforted her. "Come on!"

The clangs got louder and faster. More than one "oof!" echoed when the blind Avengers slammed face first into the poles. Natasha ordered herself to keep running towards Steve's shouts. She and Clint both skidded to a stop, though, when Thor made a sound that reminded Natasha of a bear caught in a trap. "Thor!" She scrambled towards him but Barton yanked her back.

A second roar. This one like a dozen bears. A pair of green lights appeared at eye level, then rose to ten feet tall. The Hulk's eyes. Through the dim light they saw the monster grab onto the pole that had skewered Thor's right leg and yank it straight out. He swung it like a baseball bat, knocked over a dozen other poles like they were bowling pins. Hulk then helped Thor to his feet. Clint and Natasha sprinted over and pulled Thor's arms across their shoulders, trying to take some of his weight as he limped. Another spear shot down at them but the Hulk swatted it aside like a fly.

"I found the door!" Steve shouted. Clint, Natasha and Thor ran for it while the Hulk protected them like a giant umbrella. They dove through the door that Steve held open, landing in a dogpile in the next corridor. The Hulk stopped short, sniffed at them, then turned back around and growled.

Steve peeked his face back in. "Stark! Stark!"

"…is stuck!" a panicked voice shouted from the darkness. "My sleeve - Damn fabric won't rip—Ah!" The spears fell faster than ever – like a heavy rain. "Banner!"

The Hulk stampeded back into the blackness. A rip, several yelps, and darting footsteps preceded the Hulk barreling into the hall with Tony wrapped in his arms. Steve shoved the door shut, then slid down to the floor with his back against it. "Everyone – is everyone ok?" he gasped.

"Shit, shit, shit!" Clint ripped off his black jacket and wrapped it around Thor's leg. The god was sweating as much as he was bleeding.

"I will heal," Thor assured them through clenched teeth.

"The hell was that?" Natasha panted. "The Hydra Games aren't meant to kill us!"

Clint's jaw was clenched as tight as Thor's was. "They did say they upgraded it."

Tony struggled to untangle himself from the Hulk's arms. "Cap, give me a hand, will you?" Steve hurried to Tony's side and pulled him up by his wrists. Tony was shaking. He shrugged out of his now one-sleeved jacket and tossed it aside. "You in one piece?" he stammered to Steve.

"I am," Steve said. He held Tony at arm's length and looked him over. "You?"

Tony nodded. "I am going to tear Fury a new—hey, you all right, Big Guy?" Tony knelt beside the Hulk and his knees were instantly soaked in green blood. Hulk groaned and struggled into a sitting position. Green blood oozed out of the space between his fingers, which clenched his chest. "God, Steve, he got stabbed."

Rogers retrieved the jacket that Tony dropped and pressed it against the Hulk's torso. "He must've been skewered straight through!" The Hulk made a sound not unlike a whimpering dog, and Steve's frown deepened. "Stark, is he going to be ok?"

Tony's face paled by three shades. "Look at the blood. I think – I think it hit his heart."

Steve gulped. "But nothing can kill him – you said that nothing can kill the Hulk!"

"We haven't exactly experimented with stabbing him through the heart with a giant sword!"

The Hulk teetered, then, and collapsed onto his side, moaning. Natasha peeled the jacket far enough away from his green skin to examine the injury. She turned as white as Tony. "Stark, the wound is starting to heal but he's still bleeding!"

"What can we do?" Thor demanded.

"Tone-y…" The Hulk's eyes shut.

"No!" Tony suddenly punched the Hulk in the nose. "Dammit, no! Stay angry!" Hulk's eyes were no longer green and his skin had a peach tint. "Come on, Big Guy, stay awake!" He hit him again, so hard that his knuckles busted open and bled.

The Hulk shrunk a few inches. He put his couch cushion-sized hand on Tony's shoulder and groaned, "Hulk… Sorry…"

Clint and Thor joined the semi-circle. "Stark…? Barton's voice trailed off.

"If it's this painful for him, imagine what kind of Hell it'll be for Bruce!"

"Oh, god," Natasha whispered.

The Hulk's eyes rolled back into his head and his body shrunk. Joints popped and muscles deflated. Green skin morphed into tan, green blood to crimson. A quarter of a minute later a shirtless Bruce Banner lay on the floor blinking up at them. "Tony," he grunted, "what happened?"

Stark summoned his bravest face. "You saved my ass," he said. "Again."

"I…" Bruce winced. His green and red-stained hands poked at the wound in his chest. The bleeding finally stopped and the muscles were starting to knit together – slowly. "Ow, damn – ow!"

Tony grabbed Bruce's hands to keep him from hurting himself. "Look! Dr. Richards' fantastic fabric works!" He nodded his head at the expandable purple pants Bruce had on. Nothing remained of his black uniform or his boots. "You can Hulk-out to your heart's content without getting arrested for indecent—"

A howl of agony rose up from Bruce's throat and he couldn't swallow it back down. He squeezed Tony's hand so hard he cut off the circulation. "You're healing!" Tony shouted over Bruce's cries. "Just – Bruce, just hang on!"

\---------

"Bruce."

Bruce's body suddenly went from feeling nothing to feeling everything - the sting behind his eyelids, the throbbing in his elbows, the cold stone beneath his back, the warm fabric under his cheek, the humid air, the skin scabbing over his chest, the claustrophobic world crushing every cell—

"Banner, buddy, come on!"

Bruce took the deepest breath he could – so deep that he felt icicles stabbing his lungs – and whispered, "How long was I out?"

The warmth against his chin started in surprise. "Shit, I wasn't sure you were…" Tony Stark gulped and took a deep breath. "Almost an hour."

Bruce wormed his hand up his torso and poked at the healed wound over his heart. He winced, shuddered, fought against the dizziness that kept his eyes shut. "Tony?"

Something brushed across his forehead – a sweaty palm. "Yeah. It's me. Here."

"You guys ok?"

Stark snorted so hard that the exhale parted Bruce's thick brown hair. "Buddy, I know you have a pathological need to always make sure everyone around you is safe – and boy, I'll never completely understand that – but seriously, Banner, you were stabbed through the heart. We should be asking you that question, not the other way around."

Bruce licked his dry lips. Someone had wiped the blood away but a hint of rust remained. "Strange…"

"What isn't?"

"The Other Guy… It's like he's slipped into a coma. I can feel him in here," Bruce explained as he raised his forefinger an inch to point at himself, "but for the first time in – EVER – he's not scrabbling to get out."

"That's…. good?"

"I'm… I'm not sure." Bruce finally crowbarred his eyes open. Blurry images coalesced into the concerned faces of Stark and Thor. "Help me…" Banner lifted his hands like a child reaching for his father. Tony slid his palm between his lap and Banner's head and gently hefted him up while Thor pulled his wrists. Bruce managed to get into a sitting position and stay there with his back against the wall. All three men looked up at a new voice, then. Steve jogged around corner from the right with a sour face and a glistening forehead.

Stark stood to meet him. "Is the carrier coming?"

"No." The number of Steve's frown lines doubled. "I couldn't find anyone. I counted twenty cameras, waved at them all, knocked on every door…" He shrugged, then his shoulders shrunk, deflated.

"Hey." Barton marched from the left corner. He waved away their questions before they could ask them. "Nothing. None of the S.H.I.E.L.D. staff responded and I couldn't find any food or water."

"I thought you said that there's always food and water after you complete a test," Steve reminded him.

Clint's shrug was as helpless as Steve's. "Maybe the Higher-Ups think their injuries aren't severe enough to stop the games," he said with a nod at Thor and Banner. "I broke my arm fighting a holographic werewolf and they didn't interrupt then."

"The Hulk was stabbed through the heart!" Tony growled through clenched teeth. "And what the hell was with that test? That was NOT safe!"

"You're right." Steve turned in a circle, glaring at every camera as he slowly unzipped his black jacket. "Guys, this doesn't feel right. Something's wrong here."

"A freaking cheese platter would've been nice," Tony agreed.

"That's not what I mean." Steve suddenly knelt beside Bruce and helped the doctor put the jacket on and zip it up. "I think we need to leave."

Thor got to his feet but leaned to keep his weight off of his injured leg. "Friends, I can continue his quest."

"I'm not questioning your durability or anyone's courage," Steve said stiffly.

"You think there's some technical malfunction?" Tony asked. "Hologram safety protocols are offline, communications are down, maybe there was a CME."

"Coronal mass ejection," Bruce interpreted for the others. He massaged his eyelids as he spoke. "It means an enormous solar flare. They can mess with our technology big time." He took a deep breath and then stood up with Tony's help.

"I'd prefer that to my current theory," Steve muttered. "I think—"

"Where's Natasha?" Clint suddenly spit.

Stark and Thor exchanged confused looks. "She grew weary of waiting here," the demigod said. "She went down the corridor to find you."

"I didn't see her." Barton doubled back and yelled the Black Widow's name a half-dozen times. Then he sprinted over to the hallway that Steve explored and called again.

"I'm all right," Bruce assured Tony, who reluctantly let go of his arm. "Sleeping Beauty is still sleeping but I think I'm all right."

"All right?"

"Partially… right. Tired." Stark patted his back and Bruce returned the gesture. "I'm ok, Tony."

"Tasha!" Barton hollered one last time. The agent stiffened. He frowned, and then bent his knees and put his weight on the balls of his feet. His fingers twitched, itching for a bow and arrows that weren't there. "I think I'm getting a bad feeling too, Cap." Barton tiptoed backwards to rejoin the group. His eyes stayed on every camera that watched him.

Tony stood up straight and clenched his fists. "Thor, old buddy, I think it's time for Operation Arsenal."

"I concur." Thor lifted his hand like he was holding up an invisible umbrella.

"We're leaving," Steve announced. "Let's find an exit, now."

Clint's face turned red. "I'm not leaving Natasha behind!"

"I'm not either. But let's get Banner and Thor somewhere safe and then we'll go back for—"

They all felt the shimmy simultaneously. It raced up their legs and rattled their spines. Bruce whispered "Earthquake?" at the same time that Tony yelled "Bomb!" Not a second later the floor beneath the five Avengers bucked, bronco style, and the entire corridor exploded.

\---------

Bruce hoped against hope that he was the only Avenger feeling the shaking. He hoped against hope that he was just dizzy, and if that wasn't the case, then they were only experiencing a minor earthquake. But then Tony started shouting. Cracking sounds like a million shattering eggs deafened him a second later. Bruce stumbled to his left, but Tony's genius brain and familiarity with explosives must have revealed which direction was safer because he shoved Bruce to the right. Banner stumbled over a growing pile of cement bricks, then barely avoided a downpour of dust and debris. He sensed Tony behind him, saw glimpses of color ahead: black uniforms, blond hair…

And then he was in the air – aimless, lost in a snow globe of sparks and smoke and exploding pieces of wood. Bruce didn't feel his body land. He blinked and he was on the floor, face down, twisting his neck to catch sight of his friends. Steve was back a yard. He was coughing and clutching his black t-shirt, his entire face one giant frown. Banner opened his mouth to scream out a warning when a pipe fell like a broken tree limb towards Steve's neck. But Tony appeared. He wrenched Steve up and back by the armpits and the pipe cracked open the floor where Cap's skull would've been. Bruce's ears started to ring, and his hearing returned. Steve moaned in pain and collapsed back into Tony's arms, unconscious.

Amazing son of a bitch, Bruce thought to himself. He made a mental note to tell Cap what he'd just witnessed if any of them actually made it out of the Hydra Games alive.

Grunting with effort, Tony maneuvered Steve as gently as possible back onto the ground and made a bridge over him with his body as the last bricks fell. As the dust began to settle, both Bruce and Tony saw something silver amongst all of the brown clay and gray cement. Tony stood, fell back to his knees and then climbed up again. He stumbled several feet further away from the group and plucked the metal object up, wiped it off on the single square inch of clean shirt he wore, and examined it. It almost fell out of his suddenly still fingers. Tony swore, readjusted his grip and looked at it again. Shock and exasperation replaced fear and exhaustion. He looked down at Steve – still unconscious. He looked around, the words practically foaming at his mouth, and made eye contact with Banner.

"It's a communicator," he coughed at Bruce. He held it up for the scientist to see a squiggly marking barely visible on the oval-shaped earpiece. "Bruce, this communicator is hi—"

They almost didn't notice it. With so many other objects raining around them, one more quarter-sized debris barely registered to Bruce and Tony. But the flash did.

A silver object sailed out of a hole in the wall like a tiny Frisbee. It landed between Tony's feet, beeped once and then released a brilliant flash of blue light. Bruce covered his eyes. He prayed to whatever god or demigod could listen that Tony did the same. In the meantime, part of him knew it didn't matter.

Bruce blinked as fast as he could. Hummingbird fast. He started crawling towards Tony even while floating spots of luminous specks blocked half of his vision. He crawled through glass towards the only thing in the room he could focus on – Tony's body quivering on the ground.

EMP – Tony thought – Hydra… Hydra, EMP... Hydra, EMP…

One of the billion things that Tony Stark knew at first glance was the octopus symbol of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s earliest enemy: Hydra. Another one of the billion things was recognizing an EMP burst when he saw one. Tony also knew that he was more likely to survive a second bomb than the seemingly harmless burst of light that suddenly enveloped him. He fell on his back, gently, knowing that he'd fall hard in another minute. As he lay there, the absence of sound from his arc reactor practically earsplitting, it astounded him that his thoughts were coherent at all. With those coherent thoughts came unwanted realizations: the EMP shut down the reactor. The magnet wasn't working. The shrapnel was slowly piercing his heart. It would take six and a half minutes for the tech to reboot, but he'd be dead in four (if he was lucky). He could see straight, too. Unfortunately, he couldn't see any backup batteries or generators or the original chest piece that Pepper mounted and then re-mounted after Obadiah… What Tony Stark could see was Bruce Banner crawling towards him. He reached for his friend's hand.

"Tony!" Bruce shouted. "Tony!"

The second that Bruce's fingers closed around his, Tony gasped, "Hydra! Hydra – Hydra – Hydra – Hydra's here, Hydra's doing this, that's a Hydra communicator – you guys have to get out—"

"Shh!" Bruce insisted. "Oh, god." He tapped the section of Tony's chest that should have been glowing, as if that simple act could start the reactor up again. "Oh god, Tony!"

It really started then. The claws. The fangs in his chest, ripping. Tony seized, yelped, gripped Bruce's arm. Fire in his chest – like Extremis fire…

Steve appeared. Steve was conscious. Steve was ok. He and Bruce spoke. Tony wanted to take Steve's hand but wasn't sure if – and then Cap's fingers snaked through his and he held Tony's shaking hand as tight as Tony wanted / needed him to.

"I don't – we can't – there's n-nothing we can do! It'll take five minutes, minimum, for the reactor to automatically reboot."

"S-six and a half," Tony stuttered.

Bruce combed his fingers through his hair and gripped the ends. "Oh my god…"

"Is that enough time?"

A memory as bright as the EMP flashed through Tony's mind. "H-hammer," he whispered. "Hammer."

The pain turned noisy. Impossibly loud. Or was it the screams he repressed? Were they echoing inside him…? Even if Thor got to him now he was still bleeding internally. And then he felt it. Felt its absence – the absence of his own heartbeat. His limbs went limp and he knew he'd never move them again. A flash flood of tears – desperate for something to ground him – yearning for comfort during his slow death. His friends were speaking but it was too late, too late, too late, and he told them that. And he needed them more than he ever needed anything in his life, more than he needed his own heart. Didn't everyone – no matter their sins – deserve to be loved when they died? Deserve to be embraced?

Steve squeezed his cold fingers. "Tony? Tony!"

"Bruce… Steve… God, just hold me, p-please," Tony sobbed.

Steve convulsed as if from one single, violent cold breeze. His chin quivered once and then went statue still. Tears trickled down Bruce's cheeks and onto Tony's. He moaned and folded in towards himself, then whiplashed back out to wrap his upper body around Tony's – his cheek on his friend's forehead, palm under his chin, thumbs rubbing his neck, trembling.

\---------

Clint lay spread-eagled on the ground, staring up at the flakes of ash and dust falling gently towards him like snow. Time moved at a snail's pace. A single blink felt like a minute. It took an hour for him to lift his hands to his face. He saw the burns but didn't feel them. "Bad sign," he whispered. The pain in his skull was bad enough, though. Clint didn't think he had the energy to roll over and puke but his body dragged him along anyway. Stomach empty, head throbbing, teeth stinging, Barton collapsed back and returned his gaze to the ceiling. Thor appeared above his knees. His bottom lip was a smear of blood. His blond hair was black from soot. He blinked down at his fellow Avenger, then lifted his hand.

Clint remembered, then. The magical Asgardian had a magical hammer. It was flying out of the distant Helicarrier. They just had to wait. Thor would get his hammer and they'd find Natasha and…

The object that burst into the building was closer to the size of a coffin than the hammer. Barton's swelling brain caught up with his sight.

A missile. It was a missile. He'd survived a bomb only to be shot by a missile as big as him.

"Shit." Clint had just enough time to raise his middle finger at the weapon before it slammed right into Thor's chest. With his last thought he hoped that Natasha was ok.

"Barton," Thor barked, "behold!"

Clint opened one eye. Death was not what he expected. He did not expect to see Thor holding the missile against his chest like a quarterback cradling a football. The Asgardian set the warhead on the ground and screwed off the top of the coffin-sized canister. He reached inside the apparently hollow tube, took out his hammer, held it up, and grinned. Then he hefted the weapon again, shook it like a box of Cheerios, and dozens of objects poured out. Clint wondered, then, if he actually was in Heaven but didn't realize it, because his bow landed on his chest, and then it was sprinkled with arrows. Guns, magazines, communicators, emergency rations, flashlights, flares, all manner of technology and weaponry rained down.

Including a red and gold cube the size of a basketball.

Including Captain America's shield.

"I…" Clint was so shocked that he almost forgot how to move his own mouth. "I think I pissed myself."

\---------

Steve pressed his ear against Tony's lips and held his breath. He counted to twenty, but the only breaths he heard were Banner's. Cap sagged back into his kneeling position. He shook his head once.

Bruce let out a sound that might have been a word of all vowels. He buried his nose against Tony's neck and let the tears come full force.

Tony's cheeks and lips and eyelids were bone-white. A narrow rivulet of blood had begun to leak from his mouth and now, like the rest of him, it was still. Cap slowly raised his wet eyes to the apathetic sky. "This was just a game," he whispered. "Nobody was supposed to get hurt. Nobody was supposed to die."

"Stark? Rogers? Banner?" Clint and Thor jogged out of the fog of dust. At the sight of Bruce cradling Tony's body, Clint clutched the fabric above his heart and groaned, "I can't take much more of this."

Steve pointed at the objects in Clint's arms. "Shield!"

Bruce looked up at Thor. "Hammer!"

"The metal man's idea," Thor said with a sigh of remorse. "We placed all of our weapons in one of your missiles. When I summoned mine, the rest came with it."

"Hammer, Tony said 'hammer,'" Bruce sputtered. "What did he mean – was he talking about Thor's hammer—?"

"He…" Steve struggled to remember five minutes ago like it was last year. "He wanted the hammer – why would he want the hammer?"

"Not the hammer – the lightning! Like – like a defibrillator!"

"A what?"

"No no, that wouldn't help, even if we got his heart going again the shrapnel's still—" Bruce's gaze snapped to Thor's. "When you came for Loki – when you two fought in the woods – you hit Tony's suit with lightning and it quadrupled his power!"

"What?" Thor, Steve, and Clint all shouted.

Bruce suddenly leapt to his feet and pulled Steve away from Tony's body. "Thor, hit his chest piece with a direct bolt of lightning."

"How will—"

"Just do it!"

Thor didn't hesitate again. He summoned electricity out of the air around them and shot it into Tony's chest. In the confined space the heat and brightness of it drove the other three back against the walls, cowering behind raised arms. When it was over, Thor took three steps back and lowered his hammer to his side, guilt on his face. Smoke rose from Tony's burned shirt. The skin around the arc reactor blistered. But as the four Avengers watched, a faint glow appeared in the bowels of Tony's chest – flickered twice – then erupted into a steady, fierce light.

At some point Steve and Clint grabbed each other's shoulders. They squeezed them now, leaned, let out dry laughs that were also dry cries. Bruce was not so relaxed. "The shrapnel's probably back out but he's still bleeding internally," the doctor said in his physician's voice. He simultaneously checked Tony's pulse at his wrist and his jawline. "And his heart didn't start to beat again. Starting compressions!" Bruce rolled up his sleeves, laced his fingers and pressed the heel of his hand against Tony's chest. He got two pumps in – only two – when they all heard another rumble.

"Not again," both Clint and Steve groaned. They circled Tony protectively, ready for another bomb.

It wasn't a bomb. But they wished it was. It wasn't an earthquake or a missile. The source of the rumble turned out to be footsteps.

Some monstrosity they could only described as such burst through the wall, tackled Thor, and kept going through another wall.

\---------

"Those sons of bitches," Nick Fury sighed as he watched the security video of Thor and Tony sneaking into the armory, hollowing out a missile and filling it with their own weapons. "Should've known they'd find some way to cheat." He hit a button on his tablet and switched to the second surveillance footage that Agent Hill sent to him. He scowled as the same missile busted through the steel walls of the Helicarrier and flew south.

Phil stared sadly down at the beer in his hand and the half-eaten burger on his plate. Behind him a group of college students played sand volleyball and kids splashed in the teal Atlantic Ocean. "Well, should we just go pick them up?" he asked.

"Oh hell, no," Fury snapped. He dumped his tablet face-down on the picnic table and used it as a coaster for his drink. "What we're going to do is leave those fools on that island for an extra twelve hours and hope they get hit by a hurricane."

"Sir, that wouldn't be much of a punishment. Thor could fly them anywhere. And I'm betting that red cube was one of Stark's suits."

A vein above Fury's good eye throbbed. "Dammit." He took a long sip of his appletini and loosened the string of his bright green board shorts. "Didn't even go snorkeling yet…" Suddenly Fury's cell shrieked. He glared at it, then reluctantly turned on the speaker phone. "Report, Hill."

"Uh, Sir?" Maria's voice was shaking. "Sir, we have a problem."

"Report." Fury hated repeating himself.

"I sent a Quinjet to follow the hammer and when it finally caught up, Sir, well…"

"Report!"

Her wince was almost audible. "Sir, the island is… empty."

Phil froze with a French fry halfway to his mouth. Ketchup dripped onto his lap.

Fury blinked. "Say again?"

"My agents reported that the entire Hydra Games facility is – is gone, Sir. And they found six bodies…"

Phil groaned. His hand went limp and the fry landed in the sand.

Fury gulped and wrapped his palm across his eyes. "The Avengers?"

"No, Sir. The Hydra Games staff – the agents who were running the simulations. Their throats were cut."

"Oh my God," Phil whispered.

"Evidence? Theories?"

"There are four shallow craters in the sand and the foliage appears to have suffered wind damage. Sir, if I didn't know any better, I'd say that the building flew away."

"Hill, I oversaw the construction of that place myself. I assure you it does not have propellers!"

Coulson was on his feet. "Wait, we had eight agents on site! Who's missing?"

Hill was quiet for a minute while she checked. "Ward and Sitwell."

Phil leaned his fists against the table. "Sir, I – I can speak for Ward…"

"And I can for Sitwell, Coulson," Fury snapped. He was silent for a whole sixty seconds, and then his voice dropped an octave. "Hill, come pick us up. Now."

"Yes, Sir. It will take half an hour for us to land, de-cloak and send the boat for you."

Fury was on his feet and marching towards the water. "Hill, de-cloak right now. Just drop a rope ladder."

"Yes, Sir."

Every soul on the beach gasped simultaneously when a hovering boat suddenly appeared in the clouds above them.

\---------

Natasha woke up wondering when she had fallen asleep. The last thing she remembered was jogging down the hall after Barton. For half a second – less than one – she thought she was back on the Helicarrier. She recognized the subtle vibration and low-pitched hum of air travel. Also, she lay in the same type of glass prison intended to house the Hulk. But then she remembered that Loki jettisoned the cell with Thor in it so the prison she was in now was… where?

"I hope I didn't hit you too hard," said a voice behind her. A figure emerged from the shadows of the small gray room and approached the glass. He was tall, distinguished, dark-eyed and dark-haired, more muscle than not. "I wasn't supposed to capture you at all but I had a feeling that team of yours would, well, have to be bombed. I didn't want that pretty face of yours to get scarred."

"Ward?" Natasha struggled dizzily to her feet and approached the glass. He had his palm against it, and she lifted hers, intending to reach for him – but then the blizzard of events coalesced into sold facts in her brain and she tiptoed backwards away from him, her face a mask of hatred.

"Please don't look at me like that." Ward circled around the glass to get closer to her, but she kept backing up. "These Games weren't my idea."

Natasha swallowed. She took a deep breath and tried to prioritize her questions. "Where's my team?"

"Dead."

"You're lying."

A half-hearted smile. "You really are the best, aren't you, Romanoff? You and Barton. Good enough to run with superheroes."

She gestured at the room. "What is this place?"

"You're in the Hydra Games, agent. The facility is just being… relocated. My bosses decided the Games that S.H.I.E.L.D. designed aren't challenging enough for the mighty Avengers." Ward rolled his eyes at "mighty." "They want your team out of their way but first they want to have a little fun. The same kind of fun that scientists have with rats in mazes."

Natasha examined him. Ward wore his black S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform but where the eagle insignia should've been there was a skull with octopus tentacles. She'd hoped he was just a traitor coerced by S.H.I.E.L.D.'s competitors, but he was worse than that. He was Hydra. He was an infiltrator. "You shouldn't exist," she told him, nodding at the skull.

Ward followed her line of sight and chuckled. "I suppose not. But Norse Gods shouldn't be real, either. Or super-soldiers. Or aliens." He got closer. His expression hardened. "Life is a long list of unlikely things, Natasha. For instance, there was a time when I thought that you and I were likely. But you chose someone else."

"Clearly I chose correctly," she snarled.

"If you'd chosen me you'd be at my side, on the winning side."

"I would never choose Hydra."

"I didn't either. Not really." Ward laced his fingers behind his back as he walked. "My loyalty was to one man. It never mattered to me who he was loyal to. So think about it, Natasha. Ask yourself this: if the man who recruited you was Hydra instead of S.H.I.E.L.D., which side would you be on?"

Natasha stopped backing away and allowed him to come closer. "That's the difference between you and me, Ward. I can't be seduced. I've learned to be loyal to a cause, not a man."

Ward gave her one last dirty look and then turned on his heel. He reached the iron door and stopped and spoke without turning to look at her. "If Barton survives what we have planned for him, I'm going to strangle him myself." Ward slammed the door behind him when he left.

Natasha leaned back against the glass and then slid down to a sitting position. She cradled her face in her hands, not caring about the half-dozen cameras watching her.

"Clint…"

\---------

The dart full of drugs knocked Steve out, but not for as long as his attackers expected. He came to as two thugs dragged him by his wrists away from the corridor, away from the unconscious bodies of Bruce, Clint, and Tony. It was against his nature to be still, to remain passive, but when he heard them speaking, he decided that it was smarter to listen than to fight.

God, I hope Tony is just unconscious, he thought. God, please…

"What about Thor?" thug number two was asking when Steve's ears stopped ringing.

"Juggernaut will keep him contained," said Thug One. "I've seen that guy move bloody mountains."

"I say we dump him into the ocean. Drown him. Drown him dead."

"Your head's wrong, you know that? He's a bloody demigod. If Juggernaut eases up on him one bit, he'll get a hammer to the skull. If we toss him out the carrier he'll use that thing to fly back and kick our arses."

"Then toss the hammer out the window!"

"Nobody can pick it up! It's heavier than your mum!"

Thug Two's grip tightened around Steve's wrist. Steve ordered himself not to flinch. "We should kill them all now. Right now. Hasn't the boss ever seen a movie? You can't let the bad guys live."

I'm not the bad guy, you are! Steve wanted to yell at them.

"Relax, mate. We'll keep 'em all drugged, contained, let the boss have his fun. You know how he likes to play with his food."

Food? Steve risked opening his eyes. The pair of uniformed men above him were chuckling, but he couldn't tell if that was because the food comment was metaphorical or literal. Neither was a good option, Steve concluded. An iron door squeaked open and Steve decided that it was time to pounce. One short second before he could grab the thugs' wrists, a fist the size of his face cracked his nose. Shocked, Steve lost his bearings and couldn't help it when he was thrown into a glass prison. He landed on his head, rolled. The glass doors swished shut.

"Steve!" Natasha slid to his side – Natasha was all right. She gave the guard the same look and spat, "What the hell was that for, Ward?"

His nose was broken, but Steve noted with satisfaction that this Ward guy was wincing and rubbing his knuckles. He didn't respond to Natasha because he was too busy shouting at his two comrades about keeping a better eye on the prisoners they transferred.

"We were wondering where you wandered off to—ooof!" Natasha's hug took the breath out of Steve's lungs. He embraced her, too, just as hard. "Are you all right?" he whispered.

"We're in the air," she said, deliberately avoiding his question. "I don't know how Hydra did it but the facility is flying away from the island."

Steve froze. Natasha didn't appear to have a head wound, so why was she speaking nonsense? "Hydra?" he said slowly, emphasizing each syllable. "Did you say Hydra?"

More guards. Steve recognized the octopus symbols on their uniforms. The glass doors opened again. Clint was thrown headfirst so hard into the cell that they might have been using him as a battering ram. Steve caught him before he hit the floor. Not that he would've felt anything in the drug coma he was in. Natasha tried to wake him but gave up after a minute, settling down with her back against the glass wall and Clint's head cushioned against the inside of her knee. With Bruce, the guards lay him flat outside the cell, opened the doors and then three boots kicked him, rolling, inside. Anyone but Captain America would've been knocked over like a bowling pin.

"Is he breathing?" Natasha whispered.

She was right to be concerned, and Steve knew why. The dose of drugs in Banner had to be Hulk-sized. Cap checked him over and found his heartbeat a little slow, so he kept his middle and forefinger on Bruce's wrist and sat on Natasha's left to wait for the guards to drag in the fifth member of the team.

Five minutes passed. Twenty. Sixty.

Bruce stirred after two hours. He fell asleep panicked, and woke up the same. Frantic, he looked at Natasha mindlessly combing her fingers through Clint's hair, then at the pale and bloody Rogers. "Where's Tony?" Bruce asked with a slur to his voice. "Where is he?"

Nobody had an answer.

\---------

Tony was dreaming. He had to be. There was no other explanation for what was happening to him.

He watched through eyes he couldn't possibly have as his friends leaned over his dead body. "Nobody was supposed to get hurt," Steve was saying. "Nobody was supposed to die." Banner was crying. Tony wanted to comfort his friend but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't reach him.

He drifted, remembering that trip to a waterpark he took as a kid, the one where he just lay on his back floating down the lazy river all day thinking up inventions. That was what it felt like – whatever "it" was – floating down a river. And then a voice spoke. He heard it through his "real" ears:

"Just patch him up and drug him enough to get him on his feet. We're not doing surgery when the boss is just going to have him killed by this time tomorrow, anyway."

More drifting. Unfriendly hands on his body, needles in his arms, heat on his skin… When he found his eyes again he saw men in white masks with frowning eyes. Drift – drift – drift. Men in black uniforms. Drift – drift – drift. The ceiling was moving – or was he? Drift – drift – drift. Looking up at familiar faces: Bruce, Steve, Natasha, Clint. They all had the same expression – some combination of relief and terror. Tony tried to speak but nothing would cooperate. The whole universe was numb.

When he could feel again, he felt his friends' touches: Natasha's fingers in his hair, Clint's grip on his shoulder, Bruce's hand clenching his, Steve's palm on his forehead. "You're ok," Cap was saying, and somehow Tony believed him. "You're all right, Tony."

\---------

With Natasha curled at Tony's side, Steve on his back with his head against Tony's hip, and Banner sleeping on his stomach, fingers on the pulse in Stark's wrist, they looked like campers trying to warm themselves around a fire. Clint kept watch. He limped in circles around the small glass prison, silently stepping over Steve and Bruce's legs as he marched. Nimble fingers played with invisible arrows and adjusted the tensile strength of a missing bow. Clint felt like he was missing a limb when he didn't have his weapons.

On his right, Tony coughed in his sleep. Stark looked stronger. The fever was gone and he seemed comfortable with half of their clothes as his pillow and blankets. He was recovering from his injuries, thanks and no thanks to the Hydra physicians who came and checked on him every few hours. When Clint wondered out loud why they were bothering to patch Tony up, his ex-buddy Grant Ward informed him that they wanted all of the Avengers on their feet for the next round of the Hydra Games. When Clint joked about breaking Tony's leg to stall for more time, Banner gave him a look that was as Hulk-ish as he could get with so many drugs in his system. Every time the doctors inspected Tony they also injected Banner and Rogers with additional doses. Their guests even provided food and water after Clint pointed out that they wouldn't be in the tip-top shape that Hydra wanted if they didn't eat. They ate granola bars and carrots in dead silence – each pair of ears trained on Stark's labored breathing.

Tony coughed again and Clint stopped walking. Stark was bleeding internally from the new shrapnel wounds courtesy of that EMP, and a fresh steam of blood rolled out of the corner of his mouth. Still unconscious, he started to wheeze – then to gasp.

"Doc!" Clint leaned across Tony and shook Bruce's shoulder. "Hey – hey! Stark's not breathing so good."

It took a minute for Bruce to wake up. Haggard and bleary-eyed, Banner wasn't fully conscious until Tony's coughs got so loud that they echoed around the tiny glass space. "Get him some water," Bruce ordered, his words slurring slightly.

Suddenly, Stark's eyes went wide open and he sat up so fast that his forehead almost slammed against Bruce's. He gasped and clenched the black t-shirt in front of his glowing chest piece. Then fatigue or dizziness or both hit him and he teetered backwards. Four pairs of arms formed a net that caught him before his head smashed into the floor. "Help me sit him up," Bruce said. "He'll breathe easier if he's sitting up." Knowing that Stark would just topple over if he didn't have help, Bruce sat back against the glass and they lowered Tony into his arms. Half-awake, Stark blinked but remained limp, his cheek cushioned against Bruce's sternum.

Steve retrieved a water bottle. He drummed his fingertips against Stark's chin to get his attention. "Drink, Tony." Tony obeyed. The liquid seemed to help him focus. He tried to shift his weight but his muscles didn't want to cooperate. The skin between his eyes and his cheekbones was storm-cloud dark. "You're ok," Steve soothed. "Just rest."

Tony licked his lips and spoke for the first time since Hydra's physicians chucked him into the prison. "Where's…" he whispered, "where's our sassy demigod?"

Steve looked up at Natasha. She knelt on his left and Clint sat Indian-style on his right. "Rogers overheard some Hydra agents talking about Juggernaut," the Black Widow said. "I've heard of him. He's one of the Miracles, the strongest being we'd ever heard of until Thor came along. If anyone could restrain Thor, it's a mutant him."

Tony scratched his left wrist. He frowned, then looked down at it. There was a thick, black metal bracelet where his watch used to be. The weight of it felt like handcuffs, but tighter. "Hydra fashion statement?" he asked, holding his arm up for the rest to see.

"We all have one." Clint held up his left wrist to prove it. "They must have put them us on while we were unconscious."

"Goons better give me my watch back after this is over."

One corner of Steve's lips twitched into an almost-smile. "You'll have to put your watch on you right wrist. These things don't come off."

Tony blinked. He sat up a little, taking a little bit of his weight off of Bruce. Sliding his forefinger between the cuff and his skin, he pushed and pulled and prodded it with all of his strength. Zero luck.

"Turn it over. Look at the other side," Bruce said. He took Tony's arm and gently rotated it.

Tony squinted at the shallow depression on the backside of the cuff. "Is that… is that a keyhole?"

Natasha showed him the same dent in her cuff. "Hydra Games," she said. "Must have something to do with the Games."

"Yes, it does," a new voice said. The Avengers whirled around to see Ward march up to the glass. He held a black remote control in his hand. He grinned, and flicked a switch.

Five beeps echoed in the prison. Five red lights appeared.

Clint looked down at the black cuff around his wrist and saw a number: "180," he announced.

"190," said Bruce. "Tony's is 200."

"120," said Steve.

Natasha held up her cuff. "59," she said. "It started at 60."

"You better find those keys in the Hydra Games," Ward said, "before you run out of time and I have to sweep up your ashes."

\----------

Fury, Hill and Coulson sprinted to the Helicarrier's bridge as alarms wailed like colicky babies. "Report!" the director shouted.

Agent Melinda May stood at Hill's station. "Sir, radar detected an object incoming at Mach 3."

"Evasive maneuvers. Cloak us."

"Sir, the unidentified object decelerated. If our instruments are correct, it's directly—"

A sound like knuckles on glass drew the entire bridge's attention. The cloudless sky outside the forward-most window flickered and a humanoid shape de-cloaked, hovering in mid-air. Static over the PA prefaced a male voice saying "Yeah, I can see you." The Iron Patriot knocked on the window again. "Tony Stark figured out how to spy through S.H.I.E.L.D.'s cloaks in his sleep."

Fury motioned for Hill to open communications. "Apparently he also created his own stealth tech, Colonel Rhodes."

Rhodey crossed his red and blue arms against his chest and cocked his masked head to the side. "It's a good thing he did. Might just save his life – if he's still alive. Director Fury, I presume?"

"It's an honor to meet you, Colonel."

"Likewise."

"Obviously you got our message. Do you have any news about the Avengers?"

"I found your missing building hanging from a stealth hovercraft east of Puerto Rico."

"Did you identify the enemy?"

"Director, it was a Helicarrier. If I didn't know any better, I'd say the Avengers were kidnapped by S.H.I.E.L.D."

\----------

Clint started counting. When he got to 60 seconds, the red numbers on Natasha's cuff changed to '58.' It was a countdown. She had 58 minutes before the bracelet would explode, killing her. Steve would die an hour after her. Slowly, quietly, fiercely, Clint said, "Get that thing off of her," to Ward. Before Ward could answer, Clint sprung at the glass wall and pounded his fists against it. "STOP THIS!"

Ward stumbled back a step but recovered. "No can do, old friend."

"Then…" Clint dragged his fingers through his hair. "Then switch our times – give her 180 minutes and give me 58 – give me 20! 10! I don't care!"

Suddenly, the prison shuddered. Banner, who was halfway to his feet with Tony, was knocked back down to the glass floor. Beneath them the metal floor rotated and the clicks of unlocking bolts echoed. The prison, suspended by a cable, started to descend like an elevator. Steve took Tony's left arm and pulled it across his shoulders. Bruce did the same on his right. Tony coughed, frowned, and wiped his lips across his sleeve to remove the blood. He let his friends hold him steady as he stood up. Hydra's drugs were working – had to be – because any square inch of him that didn't hurt was numb. Tony managed to take most of his weight off of Steve and Bruce, but they put their hands against his spine just in case.

"You said you weren't going to make us play until Tony was healed," Steve spat.

Ward shrugged. "The boss got impatient. If you survive the Games, if you put on a good show for him, he might give you an extra 24 hours of life before having you executed."

"I have another theory." Tony regained some of his composure and, with it, his infamous cockiness. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is coming for us. In fact, they're so close that you're afraid they'll catch up before you can have your fun."

Grant frowned. That was an answer in itself.

"Give your boss a message from the Avengers." Tony lifted his chin and looked at Ward like a god at an ant. "There's a number on his wrist, even if he can't see it. He better enjoy the last few minutes of his own countdown because after we beat these Games, we're coming for him. We're coming after all of Hydra."

"Look at you," Grant sneered. "You're in no position to make threats. Big bad Tony Stark. You're dead already, your body just doesn't know it yet."

Tony stood up straight. He marched forward out of his teammates' reach. "You think I don't know you've been watching me?" he asked at a deadly whisper. "I've been held captive before by scarier thugs than you. I learned the first rule of survival…" He waited a long moment. When Ward's left eye twitched impatiently, Tony continued. "Don't let your captors see how strong you are. And I am strong, Ward. A lot stronger than I've led you assholes to believe. We all are. Do you honestly think a few lousy drugs can hold back a super soldier? You think a few inches of glass can contain the Hulk? You think I can't summon my suit with a single thought? We've just been biding our time. Waiting for our chance. And you're giving it to us right now."

The prison sank deeper down the dark shaft.

Stark pointed at Ward's nose. "Soon," he said. "You'll be seeing us again VERY soon."

Grant finally recovered from Tony's taunts. "Good luck!" he said sarcastically. "Remember the first rule of the Hydra Games: Holograms can make you see anything!" The floor – now the ceiling – rotated back into place and Ward disappeared.

The second Ward couldn't see them anymore, Tony's hands flew up and he braced himself against the glass. He turned ghost-pale and a feverish sheen of sweat pulsed out of his pores. "Ah, shit," he sighed, his forehead landing against the wall, his right arm going limp and then clutching his chest. "Guys I…" Stark's knees shook for a moment before collapsing beneath him.

Steve rushed to Tony's side. Bruce was right behind him. "Nice bluff," Banner muttered.

"Thanks," Tony said through short, shallow breaths. "I've been practicing it in the mirror all day." He looked back over his shoulder and saw that all four of his teammates were staring at him with terrified expressions. "I don't have to remind you people that you should leave me behind, right?" Nobody responded. The only reaction was Bruce's hand clutching his shoulder. "It's been swell serving with you. Isn't that what a soldier is supposed to say before he dies, Cap?"

A jarring sound interrupted Steve's response. When they landed the glass doors whooshed open. Ahead was a dimly lit hall that led to a red door. They had less than an hour to find the key to Natasha's cuff, and no idea what deadly surprises Hydra had waiting for them.

"Clint, you're hurting me," Natasha whispered. Barton was pulling on the cuff so hard that he was close to yanking Natasha's shoulder out of her socket. "Clint, stop – stop!" She grasped his sweating face between her palms and forced him to look at her.

His eyes shown wet with the first four stages of grief all at once: anger, denial, bargaining, depression. "I don't know what to say," he hiccupped.  
Natasha grazed his lips with her thumb. "Just kiss me," she said. "Clint, just kiss me."

He did, but not all at once. Clint swooped in, then froze with his lips a millimeter away from hers. Their eyes locked. Clint exhaled softly, the air tickling Natasha's skin. He gently nudged her lower lip with his. Her brow furrowed. Her mouth parted. And then they both gripped the backs of each other's heads and pulled, slamming their lips together.

"50," a tired voice said. It was Tony reading the number on Natasha's wrist.

They parted but didn't blink as they stared into each other's eyes. "Let's do this alone next time," Clint whispered.

"Deal." She took a deep breath and then, like a flipped switch, went from Natasha to the Black Widow. "Let's go, boys." She led the way towards the red door.

\----------

Steve's eye twitched when Natasha reached for the red doorknob. "Wait."  
She froze. "What?"

"The last time we barged through a door, Stark got shot in the chest." Steve didn't want to glance at Tony then, but he couldn't help it. He cleared his throat. "Get behind me." Everyone obeyed. Steve planned his move – grab the knob, yank the red door open while staying behind it (he missed his shield), and count to ten before peeking. Banner, Stark, Romanoff and Barton huddled behind him and when he asked about the time, Natasha reported it with a straight face: 45. They had forty-five minutes to find the key to the cuff around her wrist or it would explode.

"On three," Cap said. He counted, then grabbed the knob, but the door burst open before he could pull.

A tsunami of freezing cold water knocked Steve off of his feet and slammed him against the wall. His lungs were empty and he flipped over so many times that he lost his bearings. Steve willed himself to hold still – to sense the current, to sense the moment he started to float and in what direction. He went limp and hovered like a jellyfish. Not one second after he felt a tug, something grabbed his collar and yanked him towards the surface. He gulped and coughed. Natasha had a hold of him. Natasha yelled at him – something about Barton. Behind her Stark was clinging to the red door and Bruce was treading water.

"Steve!" It was such a non-Natasha squeak that he finally focused on her. "He can't swim!" she shouted. "Clint can't swim!"

The water was rising – fast. The glass prison was already submerged. "The ceiling is higher in there!" Bruce pointed his thumb at the next room.

"Go!" Steve shoved Natasha away. "You three get in there. I'll find him."  
"Steve—" Natasha hiccupped.

"Just go!"

Steve took a long inhale and dove underwater. So dim was the light that he could barely see. He saw shadows and reached for them, and watched his fingers go through them. After resurfacing for air he dove back down. Did the water push Barton back into the prison? Did it suck him into the room right beneath all of their feet? Cap felt the tide then. A rip tide. A current created by the water bouncing off the glass prison and going back into the room it came from. Steve abandoned the hall and dove into the room. It was just in time. The red door sealed itself behind him.

Minutes. Minutes had gone by. He wasn't sure how many. More than 2 – less than 5. If he didn't find Barton now—

Movement. Light on a pale hand. Steve was just about to resurface but he dove deeper, kicked harder. He ached, bone and brain. Blown up, half-starved… he wondered if he even had the strength to pull a waterlogged man to the surface.

Adrenaline kicked in at the sight of Barton. The archer was floating just above the floor of the room – eyes shut, mouth open, body hovering like a puppet on strings. Anger and panic and desperation fueled Steve and he wrapped his body around Clint, braced his boots against the floor and pushed as hard as he could. As he moved he pressed his middle and forefinger against Clint's throat and found a faint pulse. It was slow going - Barton was a little bigger than him, a little heavier. He had to use both arms and swim just by kicking his legs. Blue light ahead. Tony's chest piece?

Steve broke through the surface with a gasp. Barely half of an inhale later he secured his arms under Clint's bellybutton and squeezed. Barton's head lolled, landing on Cap's shoulder. Rivulets of water dripped out of his mouth. Steve looked closer. His teammate's eyelids were white. His lips were blue. "Barton!" he barked right in Clint's ear. Another jerk – more water dripped but no inhale followed. "Clint!"

"Cap!"

"He's not breathing!"

Hands reached out to him. Natasha, Tony and Bruce knelt on a metal platform. They lifted Barton out of his arms and Steve held onto an iron rung, just hung there for a minute, gasping, teeth chattering from the cold water. They were in an enormous room lit only by a single light bulb hanging from the ceiling. The metal pier was the first platform of ten. Like a step pyramid, like a staircase. Steve squinted and saw what looked like an open trapdoor in the ceiling above the tenth step. An exit. The only exit. Steve wondered if the key was up there.

A gorgeous sound interrupted his thoughts. Terrible, painful coughs and hacks, wheezes and gasps. But beautiful because if Clint was coughing, that meant he was breathing. Steve pulled himself up so that he could see over the platform. Barton lay on his side with puddles of water under his cheek. Natasha was whispering comfort to him and Bruce was patting him on the back – pounding at times. Clint retched. Gray eyes opened. They were unfocused, but blinking. Steve sighed with relief. He was about to let himself sink back down but Tony grasped his forearm. Stark was trembling, ashen, but on his feet. He and Steve shared a long look, then Rogers started to kick while Tony pulled. Once on the platform all of the strength seeped out of him and Steve lay on his side parallel with Barton.

Steve closed his eyes. Clint's breathing was a lullaby of sorts. He nearly dozed, but then Tony's hand was on his shoulder. "Cap." Steve didn't need to ask what was wrong. Water lapped against his chin. The water was still rising.

"I'm ok," Steve grunted. Tony helped him up anyways. Clint was on his knees, almost done coughing but unable to speak. Natasha urged him to get up and he let her and Bruce guide him up to the second platform. Steve and Tony followed. More cold water in his shoes reminded Steve about what was going on. "Natasha?" he grunted.

She didn't look at him or at the cuff on her wrist. "24," she reported.  
Steve had lost track of time. He knew time had passed but didn't realize it was that much. Standing straighter, moving faster, Steve climbed past the third platform to the fourth.

Out of nowhere – but in retrospect, out of the trapdoor – a figure dropped from the ceiling and tackled Bruce. They both somersaulted backwards, bounced off two platforms and splashed into the water. A second being landed on the sixth platform and two more on the eighth.

Steve was too shocked to move. "I thought they all died," he said to Stark.  
Tony shook his head. "Those are holograms, not real Chitauri," he reminded them. "But that doesn't mean they can't kill us for real."

\----------

Coulson, Hill, Fury and Rhodey just sat down at the Helicarrier conference table when the klaxons went off for the second time in ten minutes. "Radar has another unidentified object incoming!" Agent May shouted again. Her fingers flew over the holographic keyboards. "Also decelerating. It's—" Again for the second time in ten minutes, a figure de-cloaked outside of the window and knocked. Tall, slim, African American, the man wore thick goggles and a mechanical wing suit.

"Like bugs on my windshield," Fury stammered.

Rhodey was on his feet. "He's with me. Sam Wilson. Old friend. Used to be in the Falcon program."

"You people know we have phones, right?" Fury bellowed. "Coulson, I want windshield wipers on my next carrier."

Phil grinned behind his fist. "Yes, Sir."

"Hill." Fury massaged his one eye and spoke quietly. "Have Wilson meet us in the Quinjet docking bay."

She nodded but cocked an eyebrow. "Sir?"

He leaned in close to her. "Radar should've seen Rhodes and Wilson coming ten miles away. Once could've been a fluke, but twice? Somebody's messing with the carrier's systems."

"I'll start investigating, Sir."

"No." Fury fixed his stoniest gaze on her. "We don't have time to smoke out traitors when the Avengers are missing in action. Order May to take this ship back to the Triskelion, then find me a Quinjet that's operational. The five of us are going after the Avengers alone."

\----------

Thor was more embarrassed than anything. He wondered what Loki would say about the mighty Norse God of Thunder getting steamrolled by one puny human. He used that word after he slammed through the fourth iron wall and started yelling at the mountain-sized man who had him in a vertical full-nelson. All he got out was "Puny mortal!" before his attacker squeezed his windpipe shut. They kept moving, picking up speed – why did this creature need to keep moving?

"This is too easy!" the monster of a man growled when Thor stopped squirming. His voice sounded like he was out of breath and gargling gravel. "Colossus owes me a hundred bucks! 'That bloke's a god, Juggernaut,' he said. 'Punched a space whale,' he said. 'You can't break him, you can't suffocate him, you'll get pounded like a railroad spike by that hammer, Juggernaut,' he said. Ha!"

Thor tried to shift his weight but the beast kept him pinned. They smashed through wall after wall so quickly that even if Thor got his thoughts together enough to call his hammer, this Juggernaut guy was moving too fast for it to catch up. Thor remembered that his friends were in trouble – the Hydra Games were compromised – he had to defeat this enemy and find Stark and… Bright fireworks flashed in front of his eyes. His forehead went numb.

"You know what I said to him?" Juggernaut jeered in Thor's ear. "I said I bet there's one thing even Thor can't live without!" He squeezed tighter. Thor felt like his eyeballs were going to pop out and splatter all over the next wall. "And that's blood to his brain!"

Thor wondered how any earthling could be so strong. It was a brief thought, his last thought, right before he passed out.

\----------

On the Hydra Helicarrier bridge, Agent Jasper Sitwell watched the live feed as Bruce Banner and a Chitauri hologram summersaulted into the water together and sank like a boulder. "Maybe we shouldn't have bothered setting up phase two," he said to Ward who stood at the next terminal. "Look at them. They're not going to last another five minutes." As he spoke, the camera saw Steve Rogers take a punch to the jaw and roll down two iron platforms. Stark sprang up and caught him before he joined Banner in the water.

Ward's expression was unreadable. Half-frown, half-awe. Sitwell was about to point that out the awe when a voice behind them spoke. "Retract platform six."

Ward's nostrils flared. He hesitated, then hit a button. Sitwell chuckled when the floor beneath Natasha Romanoff's boots suddenly disappeared into the wall. She lost her footing and tumbled backwards, landing on her head beside the half-drowned Clint Barton. More holograms attacked. Sitwell turned to see how the new sponsor of the Hydra Games' was enjoying the show.

Senator Stern cackled when he saw Tony Stark get kicked in the gut from six different angles on six different monitors. "Now this, this is why I'm here. This is worth all those years of keeping Hydra's secrets." The elderly politician's jowls quivered. He held a pail of buttered popcorn in his lap. "I could watch Tony Stark get the shit beat out of him all the live long day!"  
"Sitwell, any more intel on that bogey?"

Jasper turned back to Ward. "Whatever flew by us wasn't S.H.I.E.L.D. tech. It was cloaked, but tiny. No pings, no communications detected."

Ward grunted. "Not S.H.I.E.L.D. tech that we know of. Who knows what Stark has given to Fury? That's why-" Ward lowered his voice as Senator Stern laughed again. "That's why this whole operation is so damn risky! It's too soon to reveal ourselves. We needed at least another year of intel. We needed to wait for Project Insight to get off the ground before coming out from underground!"

Sitwell shrugged. "Stern wanted to have some fun. We saw an opportunity so we took it."

"Well his fun might endanger Hydra's entire operation."

"Relax, Ward," Sitwell urged. "S.H.I.E.L.D. has no reason to suspect that the Avengers were taken by Hydra. In a couple days they'll find you and me with the Avengers' dead bodies and we'll stick to the cover story: it was the Mandarin. The real Mandarin orchestrated this whole thing. Fury will go on a wild goose chase after ghosts. Stern has his fun, the Avengers are out of Hydra's way – no harm, no foul."

Grant pursed his lips together. "Romanoff would be more valuable alive."

Sitwell rolled his eyes. "Is that why you're so grumpy? She's the enemy, Ward. Romanoff is eye candy and a half, sure. Every straight guy in S.H.I.E.L.D. would kill to get a piece of—"

"Shut up," Ward hissed. "Just – just shut the hell up."

On the screen, Bruce Banner emerged from the water and started swimming for the platform. "He didn't drown?" Stern threw a piece of popcorn at the image of Bruce's head. "Boo!"

\----------

Bruce started shouting the second he submerged. "Knock them into the water!" He spit out a mouthful of water and called again. "Guys, the particles of light disintegrate in the water!" Both Natasha and Steve must have heard him because they stopped wrestling the holographic Chitauri and started kicking. One bounced off the second platform and cannonballed into the water beside Banner. Clint, still coughing, crawled to the edge of the platform and held his hand out to Bruce.

"Did you see—" Clint's eyes watered. He punched his sternum and tried again. "Key!"

Bruce patted him on the shoulder. "Don't try to speak, Barton. Just focus on getting your breath back."

Clint shook his head. "Dammit—"

Bruce crawled over to Tony. Without a word the billionaire pulled his friend into a quick hug. "Has the Big Guy woken up from his nap yet?" Stark asked.

Banner shook his head. "Between that injury and the drugs… He's hibernating." He took Tony's wrist and checked his pulse. Bruce didn't have to count to know that it was going way too fast. "Dammit, Tony, we have to get you out of here…"

Tony summoned a weak smile onto his ghost-pale face. "Why the rush? This is fun!"

"Have I ever told you you're the smartest idiot I know?"

Romanoff and Rogers knocked out the last holograms in sight and climbed back down to the group. The Avengers huddled together in a brief lull in the action. "How much time do we have?" Steve asked Natasha.

She didn't need to look at her cuff. "Nine minutes."

"The key is probably through that trapdoor," Bruce said.

"No—" Clint hacked. Natasha hit him on the back.

"There's got to be more Chitauri waiting for us up there," said Tony.

Barton suddenly stood up, towering over his kneeling teammates, and bellowed. "It's down there!" Natasha, Tony, Bruce and Steve followed Clint's pointing finger to the floor of the room – a floor that was forty feet underwater. "Been trying to tell you," Clint gasped. "Saw it – when I – down there – before I passed out – on a chain!"

"Dammit." Tony looked at the group. "Who wants to go diving?"

Steve looked up at the single light bulb hanging from the high ceiling, then over the ledge. "It's pitch black down there." He took a deep breath. "Five hundred square feet to cover in eight minutes. If Natasha, Bruce and I go down there, Barton, can you defend Tony?" The freezing water reached and surpassed the platform, then, so they all moved higher.

Clint was husky but able to speak. "That key is too tiny to find in the dark. You need a flashlight."

Tony's hand strayed to his chest piece. It shone like a bright blue star through his shirt. "Dammit," Tony sighed. He wiggled towards the edge of the platform and put his boots in the water.

Banner grabbed his shoulder. "Tony!"

"Can you swim?" Clint asked.

"His chest cavity has been slowly filling with blood. Of course he can't!"

Tony splashed water in Bruce's face. "Scoot back or I'll pull you in with me right now."

"Tony-!" Steve started.

Stark slid into the water and resurfaced immediately. "You two are the ones strong enough to drag my ass to the surface. You do the searching," he said to Bruce and Steve through chattering teeth. "I'll be the flashlight." Before anyone could protest again, Tony dove down and started kicking with all of his strength. It took longer to find the floor than it should have. When he finally got down there, Tony flapped his arms and legs in every direction, hoping to feel metal against his skin. Steve joined him and Banner was right behind. He looked like a chipmunk with so much air held in his cheeks. Bruce swam parallel to Tony, scanning the floor by the arc reactor's light. The first fiery tickle started in Stark's throat when he spotted a flash on his right.

The key was no bigger than his pinky. It floated six inches above the floor, anchored by a metal chain. He pointed, and Steve swam ahead. As soon as he saw that Rogers had his hand on the key, Tony kicked off the floor and started for the surface. Going up felt like swimming through quicksand. Tony's limbs refused to obey his commands and turned to lead. He saw the platform – so close – but the blood loss caught up with him. Exhausted, totally spent, Tony went limp, telling himself that he just needed to rest for a second.

Banner rammed into him like a bull shark. He laced his arm around Tony and kicked. Water rushed down Tony's nose as Bruce pushed him towards the surface. "Tony," Bruce shouted in his ear when they got topside, "grab the platform!" Dizzy, Tony saw three silver-colored blobs within arm's reach. He swatted at them twice before his knuckles smacked against the real one. He wondered what he was supposed to do next. Rest, right? His eyelids weighed a ton.

Steve came up spitting. He looked around for Natasha but she and Barton were up four platforms, taking on more Chitauri. "Tony! Tony, you have to climb." Banner pushed him up a few inches but Tony's stomach felt like he'd been flipped into the air. All he could do was hang onto the platform and try to stay awake. Steve clamped the key between his teeth and helped Banner. With their combined strength they managed to hoist Tony onto "dry land" where he lay face down and panting.

Suddenly, the Chitauri returned to the trapdoor. Hawkeye and the Black Widow watched the retreat in shocked silence, moving too late when the last holographic alien sealed the exit behind him. Cursing, Barton climbed to the top platform and banged on the ceiling with both fists. Natasha was watching Clint so intensely that she didn't hear Steve, Tony and Bruce climbing up behind her. She turned, immediately dizzy with relief when she saw the key in Steve's hand – equally dizzy when she saw that the water was rising twice as fast. It was halfway to the fifth platform. How long would it be before they all drowned, stuck between the freezing water and the sealed trapdoor?

"Why bother?" she murmured when Steve grabbed her wrist and jammed the key into the cuff's keyhole. Steve didn't reply. The cuff's red countdown stopped at 3 minutes – frozen. Steve handed both the cuff and the key to Tony then climbed up to help Clint. Banner helped Tony sit and joined them. Even with all three of them working at it, the door still refused to budge.

Natasha squatted beside Tony. "What are you doing?" she asked.

Stark locked the cuff again, watched it countdown another ten seconds, then reinserted the key. "Coming up with a terrible idea," he said. "If we're all in the opposite corner of the room and forty feet underwater, hopefully that will protect us from the blast."

"You're going to use the cuff like a bomb to blow that door open."

"The blast radius shouldn't be too far if it's just meant to incinerate one person."

Natasha grinned. "This is a terrible idea."

"Then why are you smiling?"

"Because it's also genius. Give it." Natasha took the cuff and climbed up to the tenth platform. She explained the plan to the boys who immediately descended, plucking up Tony on the way. "Two minutes, thirty seconds," Natasha called after she clamped the cuff shut and placed it directly beneath the door. She gasped when she turned around. Big Brother Hydra must have overheard their conversation because the water was moving Niagara Falls-fast not up, but down. By the time Natasha scrambled back to platform number one, it was only five feet high.

Natasha looked at Steve, silently asking if he could get the key back up to the cuff in time to stop the plan. He shook his head, so she looked at Clint and asked another question, also silently. He looked tired, helpless. "Hunker down," he advised. "And hold on."

The team moved together in a single fluid motion. Tony, Clint and Natasha lied down flat on their stomachs with their arms wrapped around their heads. Banner and Rogers covered their teammates' bodies with their own and gripped the platform as tight as they could.

Five seconds before the explosion, the tenth platform retracted into the wall and the cuff started to fall.

\----------

The heat in Natasha's lungs woke her. She sat up gasping, hazed out and collapsed again. Dozing, merely breathing and barely listening, she heard scrapes and grunts and the squelches of wet boots around her. She smelled smoke, then. Burnt metal. Her eyes stung even behind the protective eyelids but she forced them open anyway. Captain America's blond hair was singed. Black ash dotted his cheeks like blush. Arms trembling, hip bleeding, skin pale where it wasn't burned, Cap climbed out of a smoking hole in the floor with an unconscious Bruce Banner in a fireman's carry. Steve marched the twenty yards to where she lay – beside Tony and Clint, she realized – and gently lowered Bruce to the floor. The Black Widow was stunned. Had he carried all four of them up the platforms through the not-so-sealed trapdoor? How did he find the strength…? Steve staggered backwards, then. The way he held his arms limp in front of his chest reminded Natasha of a gorilla. He sniffed, wiped his nose with a chimney-sweeper's hand, and coughed. Without further ado, Cap's eyes rolled back into his skull and he landed facedown a foot from Natasha's shoe. She told herself to get up – thought it so many times that it morphed into a lullaby that lulled her into a restless sleep.

\----------

Grant Ward approached the unconscious Avengers like they were sleeping dragons. None of them had so much as twitched in half an hour and the impatient Stern ordered him to give them all adrenaline shots because "it's no fun watching them blow up when they don't know it's happening." "Give Stark a double dose," Stern said from Ward's earpiece. "Steroids and Analgesics, too. And move aside so I can see you jam that needle in his neck."

"Yes, Sir," Ward said through clenched teeth. Grant Ward was a loyal soldier who obeyed orders, but he didn't mean he liked them. Personally he drew the line at torture. You could call them "Hydra Games" but, no mistake, what they were doing to Natasha and the others was torture. Ward briefly considered "accidentally" hitting Stark's jugular to put the guy out of his misery. He saw the x-rays. The shrapnel in Tony's chest was tiny but the scratch it left in his heart had to be agonizing.

"You better wake up soon," he murmured to Natasha as he gave her an injection. His eyes flitted to the cuff on Steve Rogers' wrist. "Your precious Captain America only has twenty minutes."

\----------

Eyes still closed, the rest of his body unmoving, Tony's hand wandered beneath his wet t-shirt and warmed itself over the reactor. The last thing he remembered was the bomb exploding and raining debris. He didn't expect to wake up again. Briefly he wondered if he was in Heaven but one glance around the room confirmed that there were no cheerleaders with chocolate milkshakes. Shucks.

Natasha, Bruce, Steve and Clint were all still asleep. Tony couldn't begin to imagine why he woke up first. If he was healthy he would've figured it out in the first two seconds of consciousness but, hell, he was having a rough weekend.

They were in a wide corridor. Well-lit, clean, and white except for the eyesore of a hole in the floor. Another red door glared at Tony at the end of the corridor. He raised his middle finger at it.

Stark stood with his back against the wall. Memories nagged him. He took the key to Natasha's cuff out of his pocket and stared at it. Right. They had to find the next key. Right. The next key for… who? Tony looked at his wrist. He had time. A lot less than he preferred, but it was time. Bruce was due to die ten minutes before him and Clint ten before that. That left Steve. Tony stumbled over to his friend and knelt beside him. He read the red number three times before he believed it. They all took way WAY too long of a nap.

5 minutes. They had 5 minutes to find the key.

Tony's heart pounded – pounded the injured muscles right against his sternum. Panicking, he started yelling at his teammates to wake up. Bruce groaned and rolled over but everybody else remained still. Tony ran to the red door, hoping that the key was on a nice pedestal waiting patiently for him.

The door didn't budge. It wouldn't open. Tony looked around for the closest surveillance camera. "Are you kidding me?" he shouted at it. "How am I supposed to find the damn key if you won't let me through the damn door? Dammit!"

Tony retreated back to his friends. For a moment he considered, and then hated himself for considering, tossing Cap through the hole in the floor. Then he wondered if the Hulk could just rip Steve's entire arm off. A one-armed Captain America was better than no Captain America. "Is the key in this hall?" Tony asked the apathetic camera. "Come on, give me a clue! At least tell me if I'm getting warmer or colder!" Tony looked down at Steve. Three minutes. "Well, shit," he whispered. He bent his knees, took a deep breath and ran at the red door with all of his strength, using his shoulder as a battering ram. He bounced off it and landed on his butt. "Well… shit."

Tony scampered back to Cap and grabbed his hand. He dragged Steve to the red door, as far away from the other Avengers as possible.

One minute.

Tony looked down at his friend's white face. If he didn't run now he'd get blown up, too. Tony sighed and wished for a final sip of Scotch. Then he sat down, Indian-style, at Steve's side. "If you're going to die," he whispered, "you're not going to die alone." Tony took Steve's hand and squeezed it as hard as he could. "Sorry, Cap… Thank you… Miss you, Cap."

Twenty seconds.

Tony wrapped himself around the cuff. Maybe his body would give the others a little more protection. Maybe they would survive.

Ten.

Tony closed his eyes.

Fireworks in his brain – red and gold. An idea so sudden and large it was painful. Tony fished in his pocket for the first key again. He found it, dropped it, picked it up once more and scrambled to fit it into Steve's cuff.

5, 4, 3, 2…

Click.

The red numbers froze at "1." The inert cuff fell to the floor. Tony released a half-laugh, half-sob and planted his face on Cap's chest, pressing his nose against his sternum. "Why are you always unconscious when I save your life?" he whispered.

Behind him the red door opened.

\----------

Forehead pressed against Cap's heart, sweat spilling down his spine, Tony allowed himself the small luxury of counting to a hundred before he got up, wiped his eyes dry and jogged back to the others. "Please work," he whispered to the small key between his thumb and forefinger. He tried it on Clint's cuff. No. He tried it on Bruce's. No. He tried it on his own. No. "Dammit." Tony stuffed the key deep into his pocket beside Steve's disabled cuff.

"Tony?" Banner rolled onto his stomach and growled against the ground. "How the—? What the—?"

Tony helped Bruce to his feet. "Did I ever tell you that my favorite color is red? Funny how we've never had conversations like that. If we die here we never will."

"Purple," Bruce grunted. He stretched his arms and bent his back. "Band? Mine is Dave Matthews."

"Black Sabbath. Book?"

"Uh…" Bruce stared down at the palms of his hands and gulped audibly. "I, uh…" He patted his chest, rubbed his throat. Then he glanced around at the cameras, adjusted his body so that he was between them and Tony, and said with a half-relieved, half-anxious smile, "At the moment, Jekyll and Hyde." He winked, and for a brief second Tony saw his pupil turn green.

\----------

Rhodey leaned past Nick Fury and pointed at the HUD map on the Quinjet's dash. "There. That's where I saw the Helicarrier."

"Cloak us when we're within twenty miles," Fury ordered Hill in the chair on his right. He adjusted their trajectory by two degrees and returned his attention to the Iron Patriot. "You said the Hydra Games facility was hanging from it?"

"Yes, Sir. Four iron cables, probably six feet in diameter. Reminded me of that house in that movie – the one flying around, hanging from balloons…?"

From the rear of the Quinjet, Sam Wilson called, "Up!"

Rhodey snapped his fingers. "That's the one."

"It's sad," Phil Coulson said to Sam. "Like the beginning of Finding Nemo."

"Dude, I love Finding Nemo."

Fury cleared his throat louder than necessary. "Continue," he nodded to Rhodey.

Rhodes scratched his nose with an iron finger. "It looked like the facility had triangular bars in all four corners. They must have been added during construction. They hooked carabiners to the bars, the cables to the carabiners. The bottom of the building was never in a foundation. It's tiered, oval-shaped. I bet if a strong hurricane hit that island it would've floated away."

"So the S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel who designed and built it planned on flying off with it at some point," Hill said.

Coulson shook his head in awe. "That was thirty years ago. That means—"

Fury finished his thought: "That means that whoever or whatever orchestrated this whole thing has been inside S.H.I.E.L.D. since the beginning."

\----------

Clint, Steve, Tony, Bruce and Natasha stood side by side in front of the open red door. Their black uniforms were finally dry. Most of their wounds weren't bleeding anymore. They had less than forty-five minutes to find another key. The key to save Clint. "Ready?" Steve asked. He didn't mean to whisper but couldn't seem to help it. No one said yes, but no one said no, so Captain America led the way to the next level of the Hydra Games.

One step. Steve took one step inside the room and went still. "Barton," he said stiffly, "can I borrow a sock?"

Any other day, in any other situation, Clint would've protested. Or at least asked the obvious question. Or at least said a snide remark. But the red number on his wrist was "40," so he unlaced both of his boots, handed both black socks to Cap and then laced them up again. Steve rolled both socks into a ball and threw it at a glowing puddle of red liquid five feet away. The socks appeared to catch fire as the liquid boiled and incinerated like lava.

"There are puddles as far as I can see," Cap said. He didn't need point out that they should avoid them. "Stick close to me." Steve started walking with Clint behind him, Natasha next, then Tony and Bruce.

Twenty yards into the dark room, tiptoeing around puddles that lit the space red, Bruce suddenly gasped. Everyone pivoted. Banner stood with his back to the group. Gradually he knelt down and peered back the way they came. "Guys, those puddles are moving."

"What?" asked Clint and Natasha.

"They're sliding together, combining, and coming towards us. Almost like – like they're herding us forward."

"Keep going," Steve said in his best "Captain" voice. He broke into a jog – light and quick on the tips of his toes. The ceiling angled up, casting the red light wider. They entered an area the size of a baseball field. Streams of the red liquid flowed across the floor in crisscross patterns that swayed as if by a wind. It was a minefield. A minefield full of slithering lava. Steve Rogers rarely cursed but at that sight he said, "Damn."

The "damn" was only partially because of the lava minefield. The minefield was below a rope obstacle course. A single rope ladder in the middle led up to cargo nets, knotted climbing ropes and all types of swaying bridges. And like stalactites from a cave, hundreds of keys hung from the ceiling by brown cords from six inches to six feet long. The nearest could be easily plucked out of the sky once they climbed up the ladder, but some hung so low that they would have to stand on each other's shoulders to reach. The exit appeared to be another ceiling trap door in the opposite corner of the room.

Natasha moved past the boys to the front. "I'll go first." She scrambled up the rope ladder, fifty feet in the air, and then forward across a ten-yard net. "That third rung is a little shaky," she called down. "Don't put your full weight on it!" Hanging from a series of parallel ropes that resembled the web where a black widow would be, Natasha started snatching keys off of the ceiling and putting them in her pockets. Clint went up next. He sat by Natasha and inserted every key she pulled down into his cuff. One after the other didn't work, and after Tony's reminder about the first key he saved the new ones in his own pockets.

"Ten down, a ka-billion to go," Clint announced, all sarcasm.

Steve ushered Bruce to the ladder. "Go ahead," he said.

"I'm not the best climber," Bruce said, eyeing the ropes with fear.

"Just go slow."

Bruce did. It took him five minutes to ascend. He stayed in the first net with all four limbs wrapped around the ropes.

"I'll be right behind you." Steve motioned for Tony to go next.

"I might fall on you," Tony said. He fingered his chest piece – it was the only thing in the room that wasn't tinted red.

"I'll stay close."

"Seriously, I might fall on you."

From above, Clint suddenly yelped Natasha's name. She'd handed him a key without looking and missed his palm. The tiny thing bounced off of a rope and fell. It landed in a safe patch between lava rivers, bounced, and nearly missed landing in red liquid. "Please tell me you tried that one already!" Cap called up to them. When they shook their heads he sighed, exchanged glances with Tony, and then started to tiptoe into the minefield. The second he passed the ladder, the streams of lava started to move faster, then widen, then stretch and combine. It happened so quickly that by the time Steve picked up the key and noticed, he was surrounded on all sides.

\----------

Steve turned in a circle but saw nothing but lava. His safe island would last another thirty seconds if he was lucky. "Clint!" he called. "Catch!" Cap tossed the key fifty feet up and Barton caught it in his cupped hands. While he tested the key (fail), Natasha started pulling the net's knots apart, begging Clint to help her make a rescue rope.

Tony was in the second net. "Steve, jump!"

"It's too high, Stark." Cap's shoulders slumped as he watched his death flow closer. "Don't watch this, guys. I don't want you to see me die."

Banner fought through a web of ropes. "Steve, cover your eyes!"

"Bruce!" Four voices shouted.

Banner rolled off of his net and fell like an anvil towards the floor. Halfway down, in a quarter of a second, the Hulk emerged with a roar that vibrated the entire room. He landed in the ankle-high lava with a splash. With a thunderous roar the Hulk hefted Steve over his shoulder and leapt so high that his head almost smacked against the ceiling. When he was level with Tony he tossed Cap safely into a net, then crashed back down. He yelped when he landed in the lava. He jumped again, landed in the first net which promptly collapsed from his weight. Hulk howled. The others could hear a faint sizzle of burning skin. Again, he leapt. This time he grabbed two of the stalactite-like ropes Natasha retrieved keys from. For a second he hung there, supported. Then the ropes ripped right through the cement cinderblocks of the ceiling. When the Hulk landed in the ocean of lava again he didn't try to get back up.

"Get up!" Tony shouted down at him. "Hulk, come on, get up!" Steve shouted the same thing, and then Natasha and Clint joined in. "Get up!" they all begged. "Get up!"

The Hulk's expression communicated one thing: I'll try, but only one more time. Just once more. Roaring, he bent his knees deep and flew up like a rocket. Barely a microsecond before gravity kicked in, the Hulk transformed back into a wide-eyed Bruce Banner. He held his hands out, a child for his father, and Steve and Tony grabbed him. Clint and Natasha scrambled over and helped them pull Bruce up. The five Avengers ended up in a dog-pile of a hammock of a net. Clint was the first to chuckle. Bruce followed, laughing out of relief more than anything. Then they all shared a good, long laugh that did as much good for their strength as any steroid shot.

\----------

"Oh my god," Phil Coulson whispered at the sight of the Hydra Games building hanging from a standard S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier. He and Maria Hill exchanged shocked looks while Sam Wilson and James Rhodes did the same. All four of them looked sidelong at the fuming Nick Fury.

Fury's hands were strangling the cloaked Quinjet's controls. "Obviously our first priority is retrieving the Avengers," he said through teeth clenched so tight that it looked like they'd crumble any second. "After that, and I don't care what it takes, I want that goddamn skull off that Helicarrier!"

Wilson leaned closer to Coulson. "Uh, that's not a S.H.I.E.L.D. symbol?"

As much as Fury looked furious, Coulson looked sad. "The skull with the tentacles? Uh, no. That is the sign of our oldest and most ruthless enemy. Looks like Avengers have been captured by Hydra."

Rhodes' lips pursed tight together. "The Hydra Games indeed."

\----------

"836," Tony announced as he tried the very last key in the rope room. "836 keys and not one of them worked on Feathers, Jolly Green or me. How much time do you have, Barton?"

Clint did a slight double take when he saw the red number on his cuff. "Ten. Ten minutes."

"So twenty for me and thirty for Tony," Bruce calculated. He rubbed his bare arms as the last of the burns from the lava healed.

"I got the trapdoor open," Natasha announced half-heartedly. She kept her back to the boys so that they couldn't see the terrified tears in her eyes. "I'll scout ahead."

"Natasha, wait. I'll go." Clint grabbed her before she could climb up into the next room. Romanoff slipped on the ropes and had to hold on to Clint to steady herself. A dozen tears escaped and Barton wiped them off of her cheeks with the back of his right hand. "Tasha, there's still time." He glanced at the cuff. "Nine minutes is plenty of time to… to…"

Natasha sniffed. Clint had frozen, staring at the cuff. "What? What is it?" Clint slid his fingers between his skin and the metal cuff and they all gasped when it came off.

Clint held the cuff up for the others to see. "It – it stopped!"

"Why?" Tony wondered. "I mean – hooray and whoo-hoo and such but – but why?"

"Maybe that last key just took a while to work," Steve concluded. He looked expectantly at Bruce and Tony but their cuffs didn't change.

Clint handed his cuff to Tony. "Up to you to figure it out, Stark."

"Always is," Tony muttered. He brought the keyhole close to his face and squinted. "Ew, Barton, did you spit on this?"

"Huh? No."

"Then what–" Stark looked up at the red-eyed Black Widow. "Romanoff, cry on Banner."

"What?" two or three voices asked.

Stark held up the cuff. "These are more high-tech than I thought. This one could never be unlocked by a brass key. It needed tears."

\----------

Fury managed to steer the invisible Quinjet into the narrow space between the Hydra Games facility and the Helicarrier hauling it like a hawk with its prey. By the time the landing clamps attached to the cinderblock building, Hill broke into Hydra's security camera feeds just in time to watch Tony, Steve, Clint and Natasha grab the newly de-Hulked Bruce out of the air and into the safety of what looked like a massive rope obstacle course. "Oh my god," Maria gasped.

Fury rubbed his forehead. "Report," he requested.

"I – I found them," Hill reported. "Everyone except Thor. Boss, they're in bad shape."

Coulson moved to Maria's side. "Who's hurt?"

"Everybody. They're all moving slow. They're all bleeding. They're all burned. Stark is bone-white and shaking." In the cargo bay, Rhodie slammed one armored fist against the wall.

More faces appeared on the screens as Hill broke more security encryptions. Sam Wilson suddenly leaned in and pointed at one of the screens. "Is that Thor underneath some… monster?"

Fury examined the video. "Damn it. Juggernaut. Hill, can you pinpoint that location?"

"Yes, sir. Looks like one of the Helicarrier's cargo bays. Shouldn't take long to figure out which one."

"Good. That's our first stop." Fury turned to Wilson, Rhodes, and Coulson. "Suit up, gentlemen."

\----------

Ward felt eyes on the back of his neck. He turned in his chair beside Senator Stern and looked around the command center. A sweating Sitwell waved at him and Ward jogged over to his security station. Senator Stern sat within earshot and the last thing either agent wanted to do was attract his attention. The senator was already miffed that all of the Avengers were still alive. What started as entertainment had become a chore. Stern had let his popcorn go cold and instead of laughing at Tony Stark's near death experiences, he shouted furious strings of curse words.

"One of the security feeds just died," Sitwell reported, pointing at a black screen. "I've done everything I can from here. Something must be wrong at the source."

Ward frowned when he realized which screen it was. "Did you see anyone other than Thor and Juggernaut in that cargo bay before it went dark?"

"No, but I was watching the arena. Before you ask, the recordings were erased when the feed died."

Ward leaned in close like he was going to sniff Sitwell. "Tears? Really?"

Sitwell rubbed both sleeves across his moist cheeks. "Did you see the look on Natasha's face when Barton's cuff came off? And wow – that kiss. It was just so… moving."

Red flushed through Ward's face. He looked at the arena feed and saw the Avengers all huddled together in the net, laughing, taking a brief breather in between catastrophes. Natasha was in Clint's lap and they were hugging each other like the world was ending. Ward's affection for Natasha was suddenly replaced by rage. "If I can't have you," he whispered to himself, "no one can."

"Sir?" Sitwell sat straight in his seat, waiting for orders.

Ward hauled the agent to his feet and shoved him towards the door. "Go check on Thor. And get that camera fixed!"

"Where are you going?" Sitwell asked.

Ward checked how many bullets he had in his gun. "If anyone needs me, I'll be in the arena."

\----------

The door to the Helicarrier cargo bay swished open, but Sitwell didn't enter. He spotted Thor lying face down in the dark room. His black SHIELD uniform was ripped in several places, burned in others, and his entire neck was one giant black-and-blue bruise.

He was also alone. Sitwell saw no sign of his mutant guard. "Juggernaut!" the Hydra agent hissed. "You thick son of a bitch, where are you?"

"Over here," a voice said. Sitwell jogged into the room, turned right, and saw the source of the voice. A man straddled a round hole in the floor. Wind whipped up through it, carrying the scent of saltwater from a thousand feet below. "We thought he might enjoy a swim," Nick Fury said, "but he sank like a rock."

Sitwell's blood turned so cold so fast that he half-expected his skin to turn to ice. He made a run for it but only got two steps towards the door. Phil Coulson blocked it. He pointed a pair of guns at Sitwell's nose. "Please," Coulson said oh so politely, "just answer our questions, Jasper."

Fury marched over, grabbed Sitwell by the neck and forced him to his knees. "Where is Iron Man?" he whisper-growled.

Self-preservation replaced all of Sitwell's loyalty. "He's with the others, still in the facility clamped to the Helicarrier. The Avengers are alive, but they won't be for long."

Fury blinked one eye. "I have one man who flies like a falcon and another wearing a suit like a Sherman tank. They're on their way to the arena right now. We know where Stark is. Tell me where you put the Iron Man armor."

Sitwell's eyes betrayed him. At the mention of the suit he couldn't help but look directly at the container that currently held it – a cargo container that was only three feet to Fury's left. Phil pocketed his weapon and opened the coffin-sized box. He didn't try to contain his smile at the sight of not only Stark's suit but Barton's bow and arrows, Romanoff's guns, and Cap's shield. "It's all here, sir," he said to Fury.

Fury used his weapon to point at the container. "Unpack that box for us, Sitwell. Then lock yourself in it."

Sitwell sighed, then swallowed so hard that his Adam's apple bounced from his collarbone to his tonsils. "You won't get to them in time. The last test is starting."

Coulson unsheathed his weapon again and aimed it at Sitwell's neck. "What's the challenge? How do we stop it?"

"There's no stopping it. We've seen to that. There's only one way into the building and only two men have the iris codes to operate that elevator. There are backup generators, bulletproofing, climate control, everything in that building can run independently. The only way to stop our plan is to blow up the carrier and let the Hydra Games facility sink to the bottom of the ocean."

"If you think I won't destroy this boat and everyone in it, you're wrong," Fury declared.

"Then do it now," whispered Sitwell. He adjusted his collar and tie. "If I was in their shoes I'd rather drown than face that monster."

Fury and Phil exchanged looks. "Monster?" Coulson repeated.

"It's their final test." Sitwell smirked. "And it is called the HYDRA games."

\----------

Tony Stark pocketed Clint's disabled cuff in his black pants pocket. It barely fit with Cap's cuff already in there. The extra pinch was worth it, though. The cuffs were explosives, and basically the only weapons they had. Below the trapped Avengers, the acid-lava was sliding with a slurping sound down some hidden drain in the floor. Tony settled back against the wall and closed his eyes. His chest felt like it was being pulled by horses in four different directions. The pain had dulled to an ache but now it was getting sharp again. Tony coughed. He tried and failed to swallow the blood back down.

"Tony." Bruce, whose skin was still healing from the acid, mopped up the dark red blood off of Tony's lips. Not knowing how else to help, he busied himself with cleaning off as much blood as possible from Tony's broken body. Soon his own hands and wrists were stained. He rubbed them on his pants and then placed the back of his hand against Tony's forehead and felt the pulse beneath his jaw. His frown revealed every wrinkle in his face.

A minute passed, and then Tony said faintly, "I told Fury this would happen."

Natasha looked up from her snug nest in Clint's lap. "What, Stark?"

A rare chuckle boiled up from Steve's gut. He wrapped his arm around Tony's shoulders and let out a long, exhausted sigh. "Beer and shawarma is on me tonight, guys."

"Dinner of heroes," Clint said. He didn't mean for his voice to sound so sarcastic and hopeless. Natasha hugged him tighter and he kissed the top of her head. "Sorry."

"I'm scared, too," she admitted.

A loud click drew everyone's attention. Tony opened his eyes just in time to see the black metal cuff around Bruce's wrist separate from him, fall through a gap in the net and disintegrate in the final puddles of acid below. Four shocked faces immediately turned to Tony for an explanation. He wasn't at the top of his game – in fact he was damn close to the bottom of it – but Tony Stark never missed a correlation. "I wonder if the key was my blood or just any blood."

Bruce looked in awe at his skin. "A drop or two must have fallen into the keyhole." Suddenly he snatched up Tony's wrist and rubbed blood into his cuff.

"Tears worked, blood worked… Uh, maybe we should try other bodily fluids…?" Clint suggested.

Tony yanked his arm back as if it had been burned. "Let's save that as a last resort."

"How many minutes do you have left?" Steve asked him.

Bruce just saw the number. "25."

"Guys?" Everyone heard the warning in Natasha's voice and they sat up straight. "The room is changing again."

The Avengers watched from their perch in the corner of the ceiling as the white floor and the gray walls started to change. Staircases of tightly connected chain link-like platforms slid out of all four walls. The bottommost platforms connected together, forming a floor with a cut out rectangle in the center of it – a rectangle the size of a basketball court. The water grew tall enough that it splashed against the porous floor but didn't flood it. Suddenly the entire rope obstacle course started to descend like an elevator. The net deposited the Avengers onto the floor and then rose back up to its original position, leaving rope ladders behind it like stray hairs.

The Avengers were standing back to back in a tight circle when the room suddenly went pitch black. Steve reached out blindly for the nearest shoulders. "Stay together," he said. A full half minute passed. The only sounds were their growling stomachs, Tony's labored breaths, and the lapping sounds of the twenty feet of cold water bouncing off the walls. Someone took Steve's hand and squeezed.

A red light appeared underwater. A second flickered on. Two more pairs followed it a few seconds later – violet lights and silver lights. The rippling water started to churn into waves as the three pairs of lights floated towards the surface. Yellow overhead lights blasted on as sudden and bright as lightning just in time to illuminate the rising iron machine. The red lights breached the surface first. They stayed there, almost like a hunting crocodile, and just stared at the Avengers. The pair of neon-violet lights bobbed and weaved on its way north. It emerged on the red pair's right, with a snout. The metallic snake head was the size of a couch. It stood up like a cobra on what they thought was its torso but turned out to be its neck. When the silver-eyed snake surfaced it yanked the red-eyed snake skyward, revealing a central torso that connected all three. Red's neck stretched as tall as a school bus. Violet and silver's necks were twice that long. Iron metal plates like scales were fastened on hinges so that the mechanical heads and necks could move with the agility of a real snake. White steam smoke puffed out of nostrils the size of dinner plates. When each head opened and shut its fanged mouth it sounded like nails on a chalkboard. Their fangs were designed like shark teeth. The violet one let out a roar that sounded like a cross between a lion and the Hulk.

"Well… look at that… a hydra," Tony said. "That's just a little too on the nose."

"I just puked a little," Clint whispered. The five Avengers had moved backwards as one until their waists bumped into the first platform on the north wall.

"Keys," Natasha, always observant, said. She pointed at each neck and sure enough, a brass key hung from a piece of wire under the creatures' chins.

Steve took a step forward, turned on his heel and faced his teammates. He stood as tall and proud as he could. "I'm done with this," he announced. "We aren't playing their games anymore. No more defense. We're going on the offensive and we're going to bring this entire ship down!" Cap pivoted back to the hydra. "Avengers assemble!"

The red head opened its snake jaws and blasted fire at the ceiling. It was so hot that they could feel the flames even from twenty yards away. One of the rope ladders instantly burned up.

"I just puked a little more," Clint gulped.

Steve's knees trembled. "Avengers – scramble!"

The red head angled its throat at the group and spat.

\----------

The Hulk carried the Black Widow up the tiered platforms like King Kong climbing the Empire State Building. Once they reached the top, Natasha swiveled around Hulk's neck and hung onto him from behind. "Know what you're doing, Big Guy?" she asked. The Hulk's reply was a short snort from his nostrils. "All right – whenever you're ready." Natasha did a pull up and pecked a wet kiss on his cheek. "Let's do this."

Below them, Captain America was running in circles around the room. Cap leapt and weaved from one platform to the other, always one step (barely) in front of the silver-eyed-snake's jaws and the red-eyed-snake's fireballs. When the Hulk was sure that all three heads were watching Steve, he launched himself into the air directly at the neon-violet eyes. Before the metal creature could open its jaw, the Hulk had both of his massive green arms and both of his massive green legs clamped like a vice around its mouth. Hulk roared victoriously into the beast's eyes.

Natasha jumped off of the Hulk's back. She kicked her boot straight through each violet eye and glass rained down. Then, spotting a gap in the beast's scales wide enough for her fingers, the Black Widow swung herself, chimpanzee-like, beneath the chin and snatched up the first key. She clamped it securely between her teeth and slid down the neck like it was a firemen's pole, a moment before the snake started ramming the Hulk against the ceiling over and over. Blind, whoever was operating the machine failed to notice when the Hulk dropped from the jaw to the neck, and when the snake head smashed against the ceiling again it flattened its own snout. The Hulk roared. He straddled the neck, then reached up with one hand to grab the crumpled metal that used to be the snake's nostrils. Veins bulging, muscles twitching, the Hulk used all of its strength to yank the snake head down. Rivets popped, hinges squeaked, and sparks filled the air like fireworks when the Hulk jumped and let gravity pull him, and the head with him, all the way down to the hydra's torso. The violet-eyed snake snapped in half. The Hulk took the iron tube, which was half the size of a school bus, and roared while lifting it over his head like a sword.

Natasha raced across the flat, collarbone-like stretch of metal that was the hydra's torso. The silver head was focused on Cap, and the red head on the Hulk, so the Black Widow had no problem snatching the second key from under red's chin. She yelped, and nearly dropped it. Touching the fire-breather's throat burned her hand, and blisters sprouted from her fingers. Swallowing the pain and her screams, Natasha moved onto the third snake and started climbing its neck like a palm tree. She was halfway up when the red-headed snake blasted the Hulk with fire. The Hulk was thrown backwards into the water where he sunk out of sight beneath the violet head's heavy neck. The red head pivoted, spotted Natasha, and opened its jaws. Steam poured out of its nostrils as it prepared to spit fire.

Out of the steam, like a bird out of a cloud, Hawkeye swung Tarzan-like from one of the rope ladders. He collided with Natasha and wrapped his arm around her waist. They spun, twirling awkwardly in mid-air until their momentum carried them to the nearest net. Clint shoved Natasha to safety and then leapt himself, barely snatching the last rope hanging from the net. Climbing, scrambling, the two Avengers made it to one of the web-like rope contraptions in the southwest corner of the ceiling. Below them, red's fire enveloped silver's throat. If silver had been a real snake it would've hissed in pain as the heat melted a chunk of its neck. Like a guillotine, the top half of the silver snake toppled forward and beheaded the red snake in one single, smooth swipe. A gusher of fire erupted like a volcano from what remained of the red snake. Clint covered Natasha with his own body when the flames shot upwards. They sputtered out quickly, though, shrinking down to the size of a bonfire. The room went silent, interrupted only by the sound of snapping sparks from the machinery.

Natasha was trembling. Clint sat up and rubbed his hands down her face and arms. "Are you all right?" he gasped.

"Yeah," she gulped. "Yeah, I think so. Where's Stark?" She held up the two keys between her burned, red fingers.

Clint shook his head. "I don't know. I lost track of him." Clint swiveled as much as he could in the net and looked down at the damage below. "Do you see Cap?"

Natasha edged her chin over the ropes so that she could see. "No," she whispered. "And Bruce… Oh god, Clint, where are they?"

Suddenly the fires sputtered out. The water stilled and the smoke cleared. A hesitant peace settled for half a moment, and then the churning-crunching-squeaking sounds of machines echoed in the room. The new snakes were half as thick as the originals, but twice as long. They wiggled out of each decapitated neck two at a time: two from the silver head's neck, two from red's, and two from violet's. Their eyes were green, blue, gold, orange, black, and white. In true hydra fashion, when one head was cut off, two more emerged. Clint and Natasha scrambled back away from the edge of the net when all six pairs of nostrils glowed with simmering flames.

When one of the hydra heads spotted them, Clint wrapped his arms around Natasha from behind. He swallowed the lump in his throat and whispered, "I love you," against her ear lobe.

Natasha squeezed her eyes shut tight and smiled. "We deserved more time. I thought I earned more time." She swiveled her head to look him in the eyes. Her lips trembled and she mouthed, mutely, "I love you."

\----------

A sound like a million raindrops on a tin roof. Snake heads one through six swallowed their fires and turned towards at the ceiling. The sound breached the roof and the blue-eyed head swallowed a hundred bullets from the War Machine's cannon. Rhodes crashed into the room like dynamite into water – debris scattered in every direction. While the orange-eyed head was distracted, Falcon swooped through the hole and hit it with so much ammo that its jaws fell off.

Under the water, the Hulk was pinned beneath the violet head's neck. Desperation made the already savage beast insane, and he flailed his arms and legs so hard and fast that he created a riptide in the water. When Steve dove down from one platform and Tony from the other, they were both nearly caught up in a whirlpool. Steve's strength was fading, and Tony's was nearly gone by the time they reached the Hulk and braced their shoulders against the hydra neck. They shoved, pushed, kicked it, but barely got it to move more than a few inches until the Hulk realized what they were doing and calmed down enough to help. Finally, the contraption rolled off of the Hulk's stomach and he kicked it against the hydra's torso. Fuzziness followed fireworks in the corners of Steve and Tony's eyes, and both were grateful when the Hulk scooped them both up and carried them to the surface. Hulk deposited them facedown onto a platform with the gentleness of a fisherman tossing a tuna into a cooler.

Steve spit out a mouthful of water and crawled, coughing, over to Tony. Trembling fingers had barely reached Stark's shoulder when War Machine landed on the platform. The force and weight of him rippled the metal and nearly bucked Iron Man and Captain America back into the water. At some unspoken signal, the Hulk and the War Machine clasped hands. Rhodes took to the air just as Wilson swooped down and snatched up the Hulk's other wrist and together, they carried him into the air.

"Tony," Steve wheezed. Stark's eye lids fluttered. Steve wrapped an arm under him and helped him sit up. "Tony, you gotta see this."

Rhodes and Wilson flew the Hulk nearly into the fresh hole in the ceiling. They hovered for a moment – as long as the Falcon could – and then dropped the Hulk like a giant green grenade.

Still spitting water, Steve pulled Tony back against the wall as the remaining snakes all tried to clamp their shark teeth around the Hulk at the same time. Hulk twisted in midair, caught a neck under each armpit – a bully about to give a double noogie – and twisted his body again. When he landed on the hydra's torso, he had the two necks in a knot. They were disabled, but in no condition to spout more heads.

Sam corkscrewed between the gold and green-eyed heads on his way to a corner net. Clint gave Natasha a leg-up, and she leapt onto the Falcon's back. Sam fired his thrusters, intending to fly Natasha straight to the safety of the Quinjet on the roof. She yanked on his left ear like it was the reins of a horse. "Stark!" she shouted over the breeze. "Get me to Stark!" Wilson gave her a salute. He performed a roll, turning upside down so that Natasha hung feet first. She let go when they got close enough to the platform. After a brief water landing, Natasha scrambled over to Tony and Steve.

"You got one?" Stark asked. He leaned heavily against the wall, not bothering to wipe away the water dripping from his hair.

"I got two," Natasha gasped, holding up both keys. Steve snatched the first one out of her hand and shoved it into the keyhole on Tony's cuff. They all held their breaths.

Ba-beep, the cuff chirped. The countdown halted at 17 minutes. All three felt dizzy with relief. Steve and Natasha threw their arms around Tony and stayed in a group hug until Stark stopped trembling.

Ba-beep.

Three pairs of terrified eyes looked back down at Tony's wrist. The cuff was still wrapped around it, and the red number was now 15.

"What the hell?" Tony whispered. Before he could say anything else the number dropped to 13.

"Try the other one!" Steve ordered. Natasha inserted the second key.  
Ba-beep… ba-beep.

The red number plunged to 10.

"Where's the third key?" Tony asked. Natasha pointed at the other side of the room where the silver-eyed snake head sat at the bottom of the pool like a sunken ship.

"What if it makes the countdown go even faster?" Natasha wondered.

Steve dragged trembling fingers through his wet blond hair. "We have to get it. We have to try." He grasped Tony's shoulder. "Stay here, Stark."

Steve started sprinting across the platforms. He only made it twenty yards when a hydra neck suddenly swung down like a golf club and crashed into him. Cap couldn't help but marvel at the chances when his body was flung right through and out of the ceiling hole. Helpless, hopeless, Cap flew out of the building at an angle that sent him past the Hydra Helicarrier and into the clouds. When he reached the peak of his flight, Steve had a cartoonish-ly long moment to appreciate the beauty of the sky and sunlight before gravity kicked in.

In hindsight, Steve couldn't imagine how he missed the sound of the suit's repulsors. He'd heard them so often that he'd recognize them in his sleep. In his defense, he was barreling towards either green water or green land – he wasn't sure which – and was seconds away from death. At first he thought the Iron Man suit was a hallucination. But the arms that snatched him up were solid, and real, and carrying him. Colors whooshed by and before he knew it, Cap was standing on the facility roof beside a suddenly visible Quinjet.

Steve turned to face the Iron Man. The visor flipped up, and there was Phil Coulson grinning at him.

\----------

Clint leapt from net to net, unraveling them as he went. He tied ropes to rope ladders, and ladders to nets until he had knotted together an enormous lasso. On the opposite side of the room, Rhodes' attention was on Stark, so Clint waved at Wilson. Sam soared within range and grabbed one end of the rope. The Falcon chose a recently birthed, fuchsia-eyed snake head to attack. Dodging teeth and fire, he flew loop-de-loops around the machine's jaws, tightening them as he went, until the mouth was almost completely shut. "This is going to hurt," Barton said to himself a moment before he jumped out of the last net. Clint swung past the roaring Hulk and over Natasha who was diving into the water. His weight and momentum yanked the fuchsia-eyed head forward. It crumpled, and toppled forward into the water, taking Clint with it. Barton almost belly flapped into the pool, but Sam caught him under the armpits and tossed him. Clint still landed in the water, but at least he was close to Natasha, who surfaced and helped him swim.

"Tony?" Barton grunted with a mouthful of water. Natasha shook her head.

"Did you – get the – third key?" Clint gasped as they climbed out of the pool.

"Can't find it," Natasha said. "There's so much debris down there now I can't see a damn thing."

\----------

Rhodey had just backed away from the hydra to regroup when he spotted and joined Stark. "Told you that you should be an Avenger," Stark said with a wry smile. He pointed at the fire-breathing hydra like a chef showing off a buffet. "As you can see, we have all the fun."

Rhodes was all business. "I have to fly you out of here, Tony."

Stark held his palms up. "Incorrect. See this jewelry that Hydra gave me? It's going to explode in about eight minutes – four, actually," he said when he double checked the red number.

Rhodes' jaw dropped. His fingers fluttered over his armor. "Tony, you built this machine, there's got to be something in it that can help!"

"Are you kidding? I need a laser scalpel and all you have is cannons and-" Stark froze, mouth ajar, staring at the War Machine suit. Rhodey recognized the metaphorical light bulb of an idea when he saw it. Tony clapped his hands together once. "Open a gauntlet."

Rhodes knelt in front of his friend and opened up every casing in his left arm. "How can I help?"

"Shut up." Tony started yanking copper wires, electrolytic capacitors, and printed circuit boards out of the machine and reconnecting sockets in no discernable order that Rhodes could divine. "Give me the finger."

Rhodes started. "What?"

Tony tapped the tip of Rhodes' left middle finger. "Take it off, stud." Rhodes yanked the three-inch armored finger off of the hand and tossed it over. "Stark, that red number just jumped to two."

"Stand back."

"Tony-"

"Rhodey, I'm making an electromagnetic pulse generator. If I did the math right, it should have a range of about six inches. If I did the math wrong and the range is too far, the pulse could shut down your suit."

Rhodes did the math, too. "Wouldn't it also shut down your arc reactor? Tony. TONY-!"

Stark ignored him. He lay flat on his stomach and stretched as far as he could to keep the black cuff away from his chest piece. He wrapped the MacGyver-ed device around his wrist, shut his eyes and used that same hand to cross two wires. From Rhodes' point of view, nothing happened. There was no sound, no flash of light, nothing. But then Tony sat up. He flipped his wrist into view. The red number disappeared. The cuff had shut down completely. "I am a genius!" Stark declared, pumping his fists. He suddenly froze and stared at something over Rhodes' shoulder. "A genius who doesn't like people playing with his toys."

The Iron Man suit descended from the hole in the ceiling with Captain America hanging from one wrist. Coulson dropped Steve - shield in hand - onto the platform where Natasha and Clint just emerged from the water. Cap handed her a pair of semiautomatics and Barton his bow and arrows. Rhodey saw what was happening and took to the sky. Ten seconds later he, Falcon, Romanoff, Coulson, and Barton all took aim at the hydra, and let loose. The gold-eyed head took an acid arrow in one eye and a bullet in the other. It unleashed its fire at Barton and Romanoff, but Steve pushed them down and used his shield to block the flames.

For one precious second, Tony thought that they all had a chance to get out of this alive.

And then the hydra swallowed the Hulk whole.

Tony saw the Hulk's fists making dimples in the snake's throat as he slid down the hollow tube, trying to fight his way back out. The Hulk could supposedly survive anything… but did that include a thousand-degree furnace?

Rhodey dove in to help but another snake caught him between its jaws and forced him underwater all the way to the bottom of the pool. With his left gauntlet gone, there was nothing to save the colonel from drowning. Coulson and Falcon got smacked by a neck like flies by a flyswatter. Sam crashed against the wall, tumbled down two platforms and lay unconscious. The proverbial shit really hit the fan when a snake bloomed from the hydra that was so long it could stretch around the room. It wrapped around Steve, Clint, and Natasha half a dozen times and squeezed them so tight that Steve could barely shuffle his shield far enough to protect them from its flames.

And just like that, Tony was alone.

He looked at the ceiling. The sassy demigod was late. Not that shooting lightning into a room full of water was a good idea, but Tony needed Thor's strength in more ways than one. He had an EMP generator in his hand and there were enough bits of iron scattered between him and the hydra to boost the pulse's range as far as he wanted. Tony had to shut down the hydra now or all of his friends would die.

He didn't hesitate half a second more.

The quickest way from point A to point B was through the water. Tony grabbed an iron rod and jumped in feet-first. He swam using a doggie paddle while keeping the contraptions safe and dry above his head. When Tony climbed up onto the hydra's torso he wanted to say something – something significant - but there was no one to hear him. So, he adjusted the amount of iron connected to his generator and calculated that the range would be between twenty and thirty feet. And then, for no reason other than that it felt like the right thing to do, Tony held the machine against his heart and activated it.

\----------

Steve was suffocating. He could lift the hydra neck on his chest up, but didn't have the strength to move it aside. Every time he picked it up his arms gave out faster than before, and the metal monstrosity crashed back down against his sternum. Through a gap in the tangled debris he watched Rhodes emerge from the water and jog over to a body lying spread-eagled on the hydra's torso. It was Tony. He was quivering, and he was bleeding, and Steve knew something was really, really wrong when Rhodes tossed his helmet aside and leaned over to hug his friend.

Just as Steve started to see stars, the weight on his chest disappeared. The Iron Man helmet appeared in his line of sight and Coulson called, "Go, Cap!" Steve wiggled out from under the neck, and rolled past Coulson to safety.

"Tony—!" Steve tried to stand up but he couldn't feel his left leg, and his right ankle was sprained. Growling between clenched teeth, Steve crawled through the debris to Stark's side. "Not again," he groaned when he saw the absence of light on Stark's chest. Tony's eyes fluttered when Steve cupped his cheeks, but he didn't move. Rhodey held up Tony's makeshift EMP generator and told Steve what it was. "Did you extract Thor?" Steve asked. Rhodey nodded. "Get him. And get Tony topside."

\----------

A red-faced, sweating, spitting Senator Stern sat on the edge of his seat and hollered with rage as he watched the Avengers' allies attack. "Ward!" he bellowed to the entire Helicarrier command center, "send two security teams in there right now! Sitwell, we're supposed to be in stealth mode, how did they find us? Where's their ship? Sitwell?" When Stern looked up he saw the eight other Hydra agents in the room frozen in their seats and staring at him. Not at him exactly, he realized, more like at something above his head. Stern slowly looked up, saw Thor's hammer hovering above him, and wondered if he now knew how whack-a-moles feel.

A figure in black appeared in his peripheral vision. Nick Fury gently gripped Stern's armrest, and then squeezed it so hard that the blood vessels in his hands looked like they were about to explode. "Tell me," Fury said softly, his voice like sandpaper, "when I lock your ass up in a S.H.I.E.L.D. black site, how—" Fury's fist broke Stern's nose in two places. Thor, whose skin was flushed as red as his cape, cocked an eyebrow at the director. "I was going to say something clever and intimidating," Fury explained, shaking his sore fist, "but I'm just so damn pissed."

Thor walked to the other side of the chair and grabbed Stern by the neck. "If any of my friends die today," he growled, "I will do to you what you did to them… but slower."

Fury's earwig buzzed. "Report, Rhodes," he said.

"Sir, we need Thor down here."

"Now?"

"NOW. Tony… Tony's hurt. Rogers says he needs the lightning again. He said Thor would know what that means."

"He's on his way."

\----------

The Quinjet cockpit blurred as Maria Hill's eyes filled up with tears. She stretched over the steering column, nose almost against the window, and watched as bodies emerged from the hole in the roof. Rhodes, in his leaking War Machine armor, surfaced first with Stark in a bridal carry. Coulson followed with Rogers. When Rhodes set Tony's body down, Steve elbowed his way out of Phil's grip and scrambled to his teammate's side. Wilson, flying the Falcon suit, flew out of the hole with Banner, who looked like he'd lived in a chimney for years. Maria met him on the Quinjet ramp and helped get the unconscious doctor strapped to one of the benches. "Get an oxygen mask on him," Sam said, his voice muffled by the helmet. "I'll be right back."

"What the hell happened down there?" Maria demanded. Sam just shook his head and jogged back outside. Hill got Bruce settled in and returned to the window. Rhodes and Rogers were with Tony, who still hadn't moved. Coulson must have dived back into the arena because he returned with an unconscious Natasha, and strapped her in beside Banner. Hill bit her bottom lip.

Her relieved exhale fogged up the window when Wilson came out of the arena with Barton. "Thank God," Hill gasped, running her hand through Barton's wet hair when Sam set him down between Romanoff and Banner. Clint was conscious, but out of it. He breathed and blinked, but didn't seem to be able to focus on them. Hill thought that he mumbled "Is Stark ok?" but it could just as easily have been "She barked today."

Both Hill and Wilson had their backs to the Quinjet's ramp. Both jumped, startled, when the ramp started to fold up. Neither had touched the button, neither had intended to leave without Tony and the others. And neither of them reacted fast enough when Grant Ward burst out of the cargo bay beneath them and stunned them both.

\----------

Thor took the shortcut to the arena through the Hydra Helicarrier's front window. He landed on the roof, waved at whoever happened to be in the Quinjet cockpit, and jogged over to Rogers, Coulson, and Rhodes, who were hovering around Stark. At the stricken, terrified, desperate look on Steve's face, Thor didn't even bother to ask the obvious question. He'd just lifted his hammer to summon the lightning and reboot Tony's arc reactor when the Gatling gun on the underside of the Quinjet opened fire. A barrage of bullets slammed into Thor's side, puncturing him from his waist up to his armpit. The hammer fell from his hand and went spinning, tumbling across the roof.

Steve ducked, threw his body over Tony's and watched, helpless, as Thor disappeared over the side of the roof. The jet attacked the suits next, shoving both Iron Man and War Machine back down into the arena. When the bullets stopped, Steve lifted his face from Tony's chest and watched as the Quinjet took off from the roof, rotated in the air and then sped north, taking half of his team with it.

"Damn." Steve looked down at Tony's white face, looked at the hammer that had landed ten yards away, and then at the rest of the roof. Steve was alone. Tony's heart was only beating once every ninety seconds, and the demigod capable of resurrecting him had just fallen overboard. Steve was wounded, alone, with nothing to do but watch Tony's lips turn blue. The device that could save him was only ten yards away but Steve couldn't lift it… could he?

Adrenaline and rage crashed together like waves in Steve's soul. Ignoring his own injuries, he started crawling across the roof, one shaking hand outstretched and reaching for Mjolnir.

\----------

It took Clint Barton a good five minutes to realize that he had a head wound, and therefore he was not in Heaven and seeing three Natasha Romanoff's lying beside him. Clint blinked hummingbird-fast, forced some deep breaths, and the interior of the Quinjet came into focus. Natasha was on his left and Banner was on his right. The last thing Clint remembered from the arena was waking up to see Wilson and Coulson peeling one of the hydra necks like a banana. Bruce was still on fire when they yanked him out.

Someone was whistling nearby… Clint maneuvered his arms to lift himself up a few inches from the bench. Maria Hill lay face down on the floor. Her neck was burned where the taser punctured her. Wilson lay beside her, also unconscious, and there was Grant Ward yanking off the Falcon's gear. "I'm glad you're awake," Ward said without looking up from his examination of Wilson's wings. "It wouldn't be any fun if you didn't know you were about to die."

Clint snorted. "I've been about to die all day," he croaked. A minute passed before Barton got enough momentum to roll himself onto his side and sit straight up. "What the hell are you doing?"

Ward pointed a thumb over his shoulder at the Quinjet controls which were secured on autopilot. "Would you rather crash into the ocean or into an island?"

"I's… kill you," Clint mumbled. He got his ass out of the seat but with a gentle push against his chest, Ward tossed him back down.

"The mighty Hawkeye," Ward mocked. "Wonder if Fury would've chosen me for the Avengers Initiative if I had a cool superhero name. Seriously, what's the difference between you and me? I'm a hell of a good shot, too. I don't have your jaw line but our vanity muscles look the same." Ward made a show of flexing his arms. He kicked Sam's gear aside and sat down at Natasha's boots. Barton felt his face flush red when Ward rubbed his thumb across Natasha's cheek.

Clint rolled towards them. "Maybe Fury didn't choose you – maybe Natasha didn't choose you because they sensed that you couldn't be trusted. Couldn't prove that you were a Hydra agent but their instincts knew something was off."

"You didn't notice, did you, old friend?" Ward braced his elbows against his knees and leaned closer. "You and I graduated from S.H.I.E.L.D. academy together. We were in the Hydra Games together. The only reason why I didn’t break the record was because that damn werewolf broke my leg."

"It broke my arm," Clint reminded him.

"And ever since then you've been Fury's favorite. Coulson's, too. And Romanoff…" Ward stood up and started strapping the Falcon wings onto his back. "Do you love her?"

The world tilted to the side, but Clint managed to hold himself up. "Let her go. All of them. I don't give a shit what you do with me, just—"

"That's a 'yes,'" Ward sighed. "Good. That's good. Let's go with the ocean landing so you can see her drown." Ward turned his back and started towards the cockpit.

Clint flung himself across the deck with no more grace than a drunk Hulk. Tackling Ward made him nauseated, and the stars in the corners of his eyes were speeding towards the center. Ward yelped. Both men rolled head over heels into a dog pile in the cockpit. Clint endured a pair of punches across his jaw before he even got his hands to form fists. Ward barely blinked when he hit back. They wrestled, both bodies hitting every square foot of the deck at least once. Finally, after kicking Barton aside, Ward scrambled back to Romanoff and wrapped his hands around her neck. "Not another step!" Ward spat. "You want to get her killed right now? I'll do it, Barton, I swear."

Clint swayed. "Don't," he whispered. "Grant, please."

Ward grinned. His mouth was full of blood. "You know, I always thought that if I ever got Natasha Romanoff, I'd never let her go." His hands clamped tighter around her throat. "I was right!"

Before he could snap her neck, Natasha reared up and head butted him. Clint was just waiting for her cue. He rushed in and got both arms around Grant's waist. Using both of their weight, Clint wrestled Ward to the floor and wrapped his ankles around his former friend's neck. Barton wasn't sure if he had the physical strength to keep Ward's windpipe shut, but his emotional state seemed to fuel him. He didn't let up when Ward's eyes rolled back and his body went limp. He didn't let up until Natasha – blood leaking from the back of her head - crawled over and confirmed that the pulse was gone. Clint relaxed and rolled off of Ward's body.

"Don't pass out," Natasha croaked through her bruised throat. "Clint… gotta fly the jet…"

"Don't think I… Nat…"

Romanoff coughed, winced, and rubbed her neck. "Clint, get up," she said hoarsely. "For Maria and Sam, Clint… for me… get up!"

"Bossy pants." Clint scowled, but obeyed. He crawled to the cockpit and hefted himself up into the pilot's seat. Behind him, Natasha lay her head down on the deck half a second before she passed out again. Clint called her name but she heard nothing.

He hadn't slept for long. They were fifteen minutes away from the Helicarrier at their current cruising speed, five minute away at maximum. Hard G's pinned Clint back into his chair when he pushed the jet to its top speed. "Not yet," he growled at the darkness that semi-blinded him. "Let me land… Just let me land…" The radio came to life. Barton recognized Fury's voice sounding even more furious than usual. Clint ignored him. It took everything he had just to guide the machine.

When Fury burst into the Helicarrier's docking bay he found the Quinjet perfectly parked and powered down. Inside he found one man dead and five unconscious. Barton was slumped over in the pilot's seat with his finger still on the off-switch. "That's my boy," Fury said to deaf ears. He gave Clint a fond pat on the back, then ordered the Helicarrier's doctors to send six stretchers.

\----------

Five times that Tony woke up, and the time he finally stayed awake:

1.

Tony's body was numb – so numb that he wasn't quite convinced that he was in it. His brain told his fingers to move but nothing could prove or disprove that they did. The Helicarrier infirmary was so crowded that they didn't bother to put up partitions between the beds. When Tony woke from his medically induced coma he saw Bruce asleep in the bed on his left and Steve on his right. Clint and Natasha were there, and Thor, also lying unconscious, completed the circle.

Tony tried to take a deep breath but it felt like his lungs had been skewered by porcupine quills. His panic multiplied when he felt his heart pounding. Nearby alarms suddenly wailed. Red lights blinked and the overhead lights flickered to life. Every other pair of eyes in the room opened just as Tony's closed.

2.

The second time he woke up he found a strawberry-blonde head face down on the blanket and five petite fingers clutching his hand. Except for that hand, his body was still numb. The world was in that hand – all of its warmth and reassurance and love. Pepper was somehow even more beautiful when she was asleep. Tony loved seeing her without makeup. The mask gone, stress lines showing her wisdom… The real Pepper. The Pepper only he had the privilege to see. And a true privilege it was.

Tony squeezed her hand with all of his strength. Literally all of it, because he passed out a moment later, right before Pepper's blonde eyelashes fluttered open.

3.

A distant voice said his name. Bruce. Tony swam towards him. Tried to push the darkness behind. Another voice – a rumble of one. Thor. Tony knew that he was safe with those voices. He just had to get to them.

"I do not understand," Thor was saying near Tony's right ear. "Taking a heart from one man's chest and putting it into another's… What magic do you use?"

Bruce was near his left ear. "It wasn't a complete heart transplant," the doctor said. "They transferred some muscle tissue and a couple valves. Think of Tony's heart as a leaky pipe. The leaks needed plugged, but the whole pipe didn't need replaced."

"Incredible." Tony felt fabric against his right shoulder as Thor shifted. "The heart they culled… It was a dead man's?"

"A healthy dead man's heart," said Bruce. "The same man who nearly killed you on that roof. Clint and Tasha overpowered him in the Quinjet and it turns out that he and Stark are a good match." A beat of silence. "Not a MATCH match," Bruce clarified, sort of. "I mean their blood types, the diameter of their heart valves, those sorts of things."

Tony imagined the look on Thor's face and he chuckled. That chuckle turned into a gasp, and then a cough. Tony's eyes flew wide open and he was briefly blinded by the light in the room. He tried to summon the word "water" but only got out the first syllable. It was enough, though. Bruce put a tiny ice cube between his lip and his front teeth. "Shhhh, Tony, you're ok," he whispered, body and voice trembling. Stark only saw the underside of Bruce's neck and chin for a full minute as the doctor examined the screens above his head. "Get a doctor," Bruce hissed at Thor. "Tell them his blood pressure is spiking."

Thor stampeded away. Bruce held up a second ice cube and Tony nodded. His mind started to clear. Questions in his head began to become coherent and after a few moments he croaked, "It worked." Bruce cocked his eyebrows – the muscles at least. The hair was singed away. "Killed the hydra…"

"Yes, you killed the hydra." Bruce didn't even pretend to be grateful for it. "And you killed yourself."

"Had to," Tony whispered. He reached up and hooked a finger on Bruce's collar. "Damn thing ate my best friend."

Movement. Strangers hovered around him. Buttons and needles were pushed and he fell asleep again.

4.

The Helicarrier was the size of a small island, but Tony could still feel the ocean waves through it. They were on the water, and there was all-natural sunlight coming through a nearby window, and three men sitting in chairs around his bed. "He was the most egotistical, self-centered, narcissistic son of a bitch I ever met," Rhodes was saying. "After my first meeting with him as a liaison I begged my superiors to transfer me someplace, anyplace else."

Steve's bare chest was bandaged and his right leg was in a cast. He folded his hands in his lap and cocked his head at Rhodey. "They wouldn't let you leave?" he guessed.

"He wouldn't let me leave," Rhodes said, pointing at Stark. "Told my boss he wouldn't work with anyone else."

Clint crossed his boots on top of the bed. Half of his head was bandaged and his left eye was swollen shut. "So he liked you but you hated him?"

"No, we hated each other. Tony said he was sick of "yes" men. Said I was the only one who called him on his bullshit, didn't put up with that god complex he had."

"Had?" Clint snorted. He held up his palms as if in surrender. "Not that I'm complaining."

Rhodes smiled. "He was worse back then. And then he went into that cave… Came out a new man. A man I respect. A man I'm proud of."

"Thanks, pal." Stark wasn't sure if it was a thought or actual speech.

5.

Some part of him was thrashing but he didn't know if it was his body or his mind. Static in his head. Fever behind his eyes. Thunderous. There was no other description for it. It was loud, but soothing, tempting. It promised peace if he would only give himself to it. One voice finally broke through, steady and strong. "This is the tipping point, Tony. This is the part where you fight." A calloused hand touched his cheek and a cool washcloth was draped across his forehead. "I know it hurts. I've been there. I know, I know."

"What—" Tony whispered. What hurt made itself known then. Shards of glass in his chest. His heart was a snow globe of sharp debris and the whole world was shaking it. His eyes flew open and searched, wildly, for help. "Hurts," he gasped. His own fingers clawed at his chest before strong hands grabbed them. "Too much…"

Natasha's almond eyes hovered inches from his. "You just have to get through this night," she told him. "I've seen nights like this destroy a man but you're strong, Tony. And we're with you. We'll be with you through all of this."

Natasha stepped back. Tony saw that he was surrounded. Natasha, Bruce, Steve, Clint, Rhodey, Thor, and Fury stood vigilantly around his bed. Tony sensed this chapter of his story building towards a climax. Building towards life or death. Either way, his family was there.

6.

He woke up someplace else. Some place new. A bedroom that smelled like freshly mown grass and had birds chirping at dawn. A tall dark-haired man in a white lab coat stood over him with his face blocked by a transparent clipboard. At first he thought it was Bruce but the body shape was all wrong. Stark cleared his throat and the clipboard swung like a window on a hinge. "Ah, there you are, Dr. Stark," the man said with a gravelly voice. "Your teammates will be relieved to know you're awake."

The world had more color, somehow. Or perhaps he was just lucid enough to see it again. Tony was able to sit up without thinking about it. Without fighting for it. "Who are you?"

"Neuroscientist. Here to make sure your nerve endings aren't permanently damaged by your recent adventures."

"Interesting surname. Polish?"

The doctor smiled patiently. "Sarcasm is a good sign, Dr. Stark. Captain Rogers will be pleased." As the man moved to the wooden door, Tony asked again for his name. "Stephen," he said. "Call me Stephen. Or Doctor Strange."

A bleary, sleep-eyed Rogers ran into the room less than a minute later. Steve knelt beside the twin bed so that he could see up into Tony's eyes. "You look better," he said. "I thought… I wasn't sure if you'd…" Emotion made his face twitch and his eyes fill.

Tony smiled. "Did you miss me, Cap?"

Steve returned the smile. "I was awake this time." He continued when Tony raised his eyebrows. "I was awake this time you saved my life. Banner mentioned that you saved me a couple times during the Hydra Games but I was always unconscious." Steve swallowed and whispered. "This time I was awake." He took Tony's pale hand in both of his and flattened it against his chest. "I'm glad," he admitted. "So glad you're ok."

Tony had to undercut the drama with a snort. "The team would've been just fine without me."

"Maybe we would've continued," said Steve. "But if we lost you, Tony, we wouldn't be fine." Steve hesitated, then whispered, "I wouldn't be."

Tony's bottom lip trembled for half a moment. "We have a good team, Steve. I'm proud of us." Rogers nodded in agreement. "But," said Tony, "let's never ever do those games again."

\----------

THREE MONTHS LATER

"Here we go again," Tony sighed.

"Oh my god," Clint gasped. "Shit, Fury, you really are trying to kill us this time."

"This is not what I signed up for," said Sam Wilson.

"I'm too old for this," said Rhodes.

"Is it the shield games or the S.H.I.E.L.D. games?" Natasha wondered.

"Yes," Nick Fury said with a hint of a smirk.

It was a sunny day in upstate New York. Fury, Hill, Coulson, and The Avengers stood together on the grassy green plateau above a round valley. From their bird's eye view, the obstacle course below did sort of resemble Cap's shield. There were three concentric circles. The ground on the outer layer was dyed red, the next white, and then red again. The central blue circle had a white star in it and at the center of the star was a bell. First one to the bell, wins. Of course, that first one had to go through three layers of obstacles, each one harder than the previous.

Thor leaned down to Romanoff. "I do not understand," he whispered. "Are the red and yellow spheres in that first ditch dangerous? Incendiary, perhaps?"

Natasha squinted. Her spy's eyes took in every angle, every shortcut, every safe passage through the game. "It's not the ball pit that worries me," she said with a frown. "Lassoing the antlers on that Loki statue with a hula-hoop… That'll slow me down."

"Are the big rubber tires meant to be thrown?"

"Nah. Just crawl through them. If you can fit."

"Is that a watermelon in the pool?" Steve blocked the sun from his eyes. "What do we have to do – just get it through that basketball hoop on the other side?"

"It's harder than it looks," Hill warned. "The watermelon is greased with lard. Makes it impossibly slippery. Didn't you play that game when you were a kid?"

"Might be able to skewer it with those candy canes from the life-size Candyland game," said Bruce.

"That's cheating," said Phil.

"So I can't take the pillowcase with me after the sack race?" asked Steve.

"Can we at least use the pool noodles after we hurdle them?" Bruce wondered. "Not because I need to float. I just want to use them to hit Tony in the pool."

"I'm first in line," said Stark, muscling his way to the starting point. He gently tapped his chest. "Still healing, here. I get a handicap." When everyone shared smiles, and no one argued, Tony adjusted his swimming trunks, bent his knees, and took a sprinter's stance. "One two three – go!" he shouted. Tony ran ten steps, leapt forward, landed on his belly, and sped, laughing, down a slip n' slide.

The End


End file.
